Thrall

A Daniel Black Novel

By E. William Brown

Copyright 2018 E. William Brown

Amazon Kindle Edition

Chapter 1

“I must say, this is a bit disturbing.”

That wasn’t exactly what I wanted to hear from Elin when she was in the middle of giving me a magical examination. Especially since Cerise was nodding along.

“Yeah, I didn’t think she had it in her. I knew she was powerful, but this is pretty damned subtle. When did she get so sneaky?”

“Cerise, we’re discussing a woman who was able to infiltrate both the Red Conclave and our own group without arousing the slightest suspicion, at a time when we were all looking for a spy. Should I point out that she also has her father’s hair and eyes, but somehow no one thought anything of it? She may pretend to be a blunt instrument, but she is far more devious than she seems.”

“You two are making me nervous here,” I said. “What are you seeing?”

“Oh, you guessed right,” Cerise said. “It looks like Mara broke the restriction on what women you can have sex with. We’re just amazed at how clean it is. I didn’t think it was possible to break one aspect of a coven bond without affecting anything else. But she basically just slipped in an exception that makes her fair game, without touching anything else.”

“I, too, would have been skeptical regarding the possibility,” Elin agreed. “Yet here we are. The remainder of the bond is perfectly intact and unaltered, so far as I can determine. You say you didn’t even see her do it?”

“I was a little distracted at the time. But no, I didn’t see a thing. With everything else that was going on I didn’t even think to wonder about it until we were halfway back to Kozalin.”

Mara was a beautiful woman, not to mention demanding and completely uninhibited. I’d felt some attraction towards her ever since our first meeting, so at the time it had seemed perfectly reasonable that I’d found myself responding to her. It wasn’t until later that I realized it shouldn’t have been possible, given the way Cerise had written our coven binding. My girls weren’t interested in other men, and I wasn’t supposed to be interested in other women. Cerise had insisted on keeping the loophole that made our female followers fair game, but Mara certainly didn’t fall into that category. After worrying about it for half the trip home, I hadn’t wasted any time dragging Cerise and Elin off to the ritual chamber to figure out what happened.

Cerise chuckled. “Lucky bastard. Next time I want to be the one who gets the hot demigoddess so worked up she works a miracle just so she can bang me.”

Elin pushed a lock of dark green hair out of her face, and frowned. “Cerise, can you please be serious for once? If she could do that, what else might she have done? With that level of wizardry-”

“No,” Cerise interrupted. “It’s not wizardry, it’s divine power. And you’re right, that’s a good thing, because I’d be fucking terrified of someone who could do this with wizardry. But I think I get it now. We know what Mara’s primary aspect is, right Daniel?”

“Her mother said she’s fire and freedom,” I said. “Mind you, I’m not entirely sure what that means.”

“It’s how divine power works. Gods are more like living ideas than creatures of flesh and blood, and they can work a special kind of magic with the principles they embody. Sort of like sorcery, only it’s all about being something instead of controlling it. Mara can break any binding because she’s the embodiment of freedom.”

Elin frowned thoughtfully. “Why haven’t I read this anywhere?”

“The gods don’t exactly advertise it,” Cerise pointed out. “Most of the older ones have some sorcery too, and they take on more aspects as they age. They like to keep mortals guessing about what their limits are, and they’re pretty good at it. But some of my cult’s secrets revolve around invoking Hecate’s aspects, so she’s told us a little about how it works.”

“I see,” Elin replied. “So, Mara probably has no idea exactly how she did it, then? She just invoked her power to remove any obstacles in her path?”

“Exactly.”

“Wait, if it’s like sorcery, does that mean she can take away freedoms too?” I asked.

“No, she doesn’t control freedom, she embodies it. She probably couldn’t work a binding to save her life. I doubt she knows all that much about wizardry, either. Her mother hates that shit. At most she’s had a few months of training with whatever instructors her dad could find for her.”

Elin gave the coven magic one last, long look, and sighed. “Very well. I suppose we’re safe, then. But I’m still a bit cross with you, Daniel. Sharing you with outsiders was not part of the deal.”

“Yeah, I’m sorry about that,” I said. “It’s not exactly something I planned. Mind you, I don’t know that we would have gotten out of Skogheim alive if I hadn’t given her what she wanted.”

“I think it’s an opportunity,” Cerise said. “She’d be a great ally if you can reel her in. I still wish she could have joined us when we first formed the coven. Although, come to think of it, I guess trying to include her in a coven binding wouldn’t have worked.”

“I should think not,” Elin said dryly. “I don’t see much hope of an alliance with someone who desires our destruction, either.”

“That’s something I wanted to talk to you two about,” I said. “And Avilla, too. If we’re done here?”

“You get a clean bill of health from me, big guy,” Cerise said.

“From me as well,” Elin agreed. “I can find no sign of hostile magic on you, or of any other changes to our coven bonds.

That was reassuring. The circumstances that had brought my coven together may have been less than ideal, but we were happy together. I couldn’t let anything threaten that.

Tina greeted us all with hugs and kisses when we entered the dining room. The phenomenally buxom redhead was as cheerful as ever. Maybe more so. Being pregnant seemed to agree with her, and she loved being a catgirl.

“No one looks worried,” she observed. “Does that mean everything's alright?”

“Yeah, we’re good,” Cerise assured her, detouring by the kitchen to give Avilla a kiss on the cheek.

“I’m glad to hear it,” Avilla said. “Daniel? I know you just got back, but I’d like to have a coven meeting after we all eat. There’s been a lot happening while you were gone, and I think we need to discuss things.”

“Sure. What did I miss?”

“After we eat,” she insisted. “There’s no emergency, so take a seat and relax. Dinner is almost ready.”

That was probably good advice. I’d spent the last couple of weeks working night and day, culminating in the secret mission to Skogheim that I’d just returned from. A mission that was going to lead to the deaths of several million andregi, the Neanderthal-like ape men who served as Gaea’s main source of cannon fodder. Granted, they were trying to exterminate humanity, and my own stronghold seemed to be right up at the top of their target list. But that still wasn’t something I wanted to dwell on. It would be nice to just spend some time with my girls, and remind myself what I was protecting.

Only a month since we’d come together to form the coven, but already things were changing. For the better, I think, but everything had moved so fast it was hard to keep track sometimes.

Elin was far more relaxed now. The frightened girl who thought no one could ever want her was melting away, being replaced by a confident young scholar who livened our conversations with references  to the philosophy, history and classical literature of this world. She wore the slender, elegant faerie shape we’d crafted together more comfortably, and if her teeth sometimes turned into a mass of sharp points when she got caught up in an argument no one in our group would bat an eye. The gown she wore was a far cry from the concealing robes she’d favored when we first met, a classy but form-fitting garment that subtly showed off her figure. She looked like some noble lady, with gold rings on her fingers and her waist-length hair woven into a complicated arrangement decorated with little golden bangles.

She was still shy about our bedroom adventures, and every now and then I caught her staring into a mirror with tears in her eyes. But she was determined to explore this new world of intimacy that she’d found herself a part of, and she was starting to overcome her inhibitions. It was still rare for her to initiate anything, but the way she’d try to lure us into seducing her had a certain charm. That, and her blushes were adorable.

Tina looked more pregnant every time I saw her, which wasn’t surprising since Bast had told us she’d come to term in just a couple of months. The extra weight didn’t seem to bother her, though. With the enhanced strength of her catgirl form she still carried herself as lightly as ever, and her smile was radiant.

Her tastes were still pretty simple, as you’d expect from a peasant girl who honestly wasn’t very bright. But she’d eagerly embraced the hedonistic lifestyle that my witches encouraged, and was broadening her horizons at an amazing rate. She sat at the table in a scandalous dress that left several acres of cleavage bare to my gaze, and she made a game of playfully bouncing and shifting around to draw my attention to them.

Although, now that I looked, there was a hint of magic rising from under her dress that made me suspect another reason why she couldn’t sit still. It felt like elvish magic, something subtle and complex, blending elements of flesh magic with a weak electrical effect that pulsed in time with her breathing.

Was she teasing herself with some kind of elvish sex toy? No wonder she looked so excited.

Cerise seemed more businesslike, especially in her new gear. While I was away she’d replaced her tight leather catsuit with an equally form-fitting suit of armor that showed a distinct elvish influence. It fitted her lithe curves like a second skin, obviously designed to show off her body as much as to protect it, but there was a substantial amount of magic woven into the garment.

The changes in the murder witch’s personal aura were more impressive, though. Her magic seemed noticeably better balanced than it had just a week ago, with the demonic and draconic influences less obvious. She was letting a little of her supernatural allure leak out, but it wasn’t as indiscriminately predatory as before. Less a ravening beast on the hunt, and more a wolf resting with her pack.

Although… was it just me, or had she gotten taller? Her outfit had the flat, flexible soles of elven footwear instead of the heels of human boots, but somehow she still seemed a little taller than Elin now. She’d grown her hair out, too, and the cascade of silky black waves almost reached her waist. An incidental effect of tinkering with her magic, or was she being competitive?

I was distracted from wondering about it when Avilla came in with a serving platter in her hands, and a string of maids behind her. My golden-haired domestic goddess had been worn with worry when I first returned from Skogheim, and she’d enveloped me in a hug and welcomed me home with tears of relief in her eyes. She was definitely a worrier, but now that I was safely home she was all smiles. She’d changed into a new dress, a pretty green number with a knee-length skirt and a neckline as scandalous as Tina’s, and the heated look she gave me as she claimed her seat promised a busy night.

Her maids laid out the rest of the meal with practiced precision, and then poured the wine and withdrew to the kitchen. As they made their retreat I noted that they seemed noticeably more skilled at their tasks than when I’d left, and their uniforms had changed some as well. Avilla had them in lacy black dresses with a skirt that only fell to mid-thigh, and a neckline as daring as her own. Their sleeves came all the way to the wrist, their shoes were more like low-cut boots, and each of them had a red lightning bolt embroidered at the shoulder.

“Do you like the new dresses?” Avilla asked. “I’m still playing with ideas, but I think I like this version. Sefwin is helping me come up with a design that will work for her people too.”

“Really? That doesn’t seem very practical for a bodyguard.”

Sefwin was the heir to the Nethwillin clan of dark elves, but since she was hardly likely to inherit anytime soon I’d offered her a position running my secret service. I wanted someone capable making sure my family wasn’t going to get assassinated while I was busy dealing with some crisis, and she seemed like a good fit for that.

The fact that she was an exotic young beauty who was friendly, interesting to talk to and convinced that we shared some kind of fate bond had nothing to do with it. Really. The thought of getting closer to her, and maybe finding out what elves are like in bed at some point, had never crossed my mind.

Avilla smiled, and called one of the maids over.

“Anyone who sees them will assume they’re just decorative, but watch. Julia, show Daniel your hidden tricks.”

“Yes, Miss Avilla,” the girl, a cute brunette with rather nice legs, said eagerly. “Watch close, milord. Fast knife.”

She flicked her wrist, and a pretty little knife appeared in her hand. There was just a whisper of magic involved, of the subtle sort that the elves generally preferred. A hidden wrist sheath, then?

She put it away just as easily, and then made three shuriken appear in her other hand. “Throwing stars.”

She put them away, and reached both hands into the bow at the small of her back. They came out holding a pair of ten-inch combat knives. “Fighting blades, too. Not that any of us know how to use them properly, but Lady Sefwin’s people have started showing us a few tricks.”

She made the daggers vanish just as easily as she had the smaller blades. Then she took my hand, and put it on the front of her dress. “Feel that, milord? The elves can weave cloth out of metal somehow, and make it come out any color they like. The whole dress is like mail, even the skirts. There’s another version where the front comes up to the neck for protection, but I think Miss Avilla likes this one better. I’ve seen a couple of elves practice fighting in it, and the way they bounce would distract any man. Oh, and we’ve a few other surprises hidden under our skirts, but those aren’t fit for public.”

I chuckled. “I can imagine. Lacy underthings, or does Avilla have you girls going around with no panties?”

“That’s the least of it, milord,” she giggled. “Miss Avilla has the most wicked ideas. There’s no telling what you might find, should you go about lifting skirts.”

“That’s enough of that, Julia,” Avilla said. “Off you go.”

The girl gave a curtsey that exposed quite a bit of bare thigh, and scurried back to her place.

“Alright, I see you’ve got the hidden weapons angle covered” I said. “But how would elven guards blend in with a group of humans?”

Contrary to the myths from my world, dark elves weren’t skinny little waifs with pointed ears. Most of them were so stacked I would have assumed they had implants back home, and their ears were too long and mobile to hide easily. Not to mention that their skin tones were a lot darker than any of the humans who lived in Northern Europe.

Avilla turned to the breakfast bar, where half a dozen maids were lined up waiting in case we needed anything. “Girls? Raise your hand if you’d like to have a bust like an elf.”

Five hands went up. A couple of the girls raised both hands, and hopped up and down waving them around. Elin snorted at that.

“I hope you’re prepared for back pains, and not being able to lie down on them.”

“It’s worth it,” Tina interjected. “There’s nothing like the power of big boobies. You can make a man forget what he was saying just by taking a deep breath. But I call dibs on having the biggest pair in the palace. Okay, Daniel?”

I laughed. “Sure thing, Tina.”

She’d been buxom before we’d met, and then she’d taken several opportunities to talk me into giving her upgrades with my flesh magic. She finally seemed content with her assets after the last session, which was a good thing because if she were any bigger it would definitely be too much.

Avila smiled tolerantly at her. “That’s your thing, sweetie, and no one wants to take it away from you. But that wasn’t my point. Girls, who’d be willing to get turned into an elf completely?”

Most of the hands went down at that, but a couple of the maids still had one raised. Well, that was a lot more adventurous than I’d expected.

“How about being a catgirl, like Tina?”

That got half their hands up.

“A wolfen, like Gudrun and Daria?”

Four volunteers this time. Avilla smiled at me.

“You see? Just make some time to work on it, and my girls will be happy to look so exotic anyone could blend in with them. Sefwin wants to recruit some wolfen as agents, too, if you and Cerise can figure out how to make more.”

“That sounds like a fun little project,” I admitted. “I’ve also got some patterns for magically enhancing humans that I’ve never had a chance to use, just because it would take too much time. We should set up regular self-defense training for all the maids, too. If they’re going to be carrying weapons they should know how to use them.”

Avilla liked that idea. She seemed to be pretty involved in her little maid training project, which made for entertaining dinner conversation. When she’d first started recruiting I think she was really just collecting a group of cute girls she could play out some of her fantasies with, but the project had taken on a life of its own. With tens of thousands of refugees crowding the city she’d had no trouble finding talented help, and they all seemed fiercely grateful for the chance to work as servants in my stronghold.

Being a hearth witch, Avilla’s standards of performance for domestic staff were pretty insane. She’d started an aggressive training program for the staff now that she had time, and I’d been a little worried that she’d go too far with it. But to my surprise the girls had mostly seen that as an opportunity, and thrown themselves eagerly into the work. Apparently having the chance to learn from the best appealed to them, especially since being Avilla’s little minions meant they were soaking up a little domestic magic of their own.

I’m pretty sure her methods of maintaining discipline could have been lifted from softcore bondage porn, considering the way Cerise teased her about it. But no one had ever come to me with a complaint, and they seemed to be enjoying themselves. I made a mental note that I should probably look into that a little more if I ever had a spare moment, but it wasn’t exactly a high priority.

The idea of teaching them all to fight seemed to intrigue Avilla. Not that they were going to turn into heroic warriors overnight or anything, but with the amount of magic we had available they didn’t have to. A willingness to fight, some basic training and a collection of magic weapons would be more than enough to handle a lot of threats. We could easily prepare them to deal with goblins or muggers on their own, and if they ever encountered something more serious they’d at least have a better chance at escaping while Sefwin’s agents handled it.

Avilla wasn’t the only one collecting her own followers, of course. Cerise was teaching witchcraft to Tina’s childhood friend Beri, and she’d picked up a couple of other novices as well. She’d also more or less taken over Corinna’s band of warrior dryads, and she’d been continuing our experiments with powering up the nature spirits by pouring mana into their land.

“You’re going to love all the benefits you get out of the deal,” she told me. “It’s working just like we thought. I feed magic from my amulet into their land, and it makes them stronger. Then they do their thing, and it makes me stronger too.”

“Their thing?” I asked.

She grinned at me. “You’ll see. Pelagia is going to hold a revel for you, to get things going with her grove. It’s heady stuff, the way they practically worship you when they’re showing their appreciation.”

“I’m not a god,” I pointed out.

“Not yet. This is going to make both of us demigods, though, and I bet we don’t stop there. What are the odds we can get our hands on some of Idun’s apples before this war ends?”

“Speaking of which, I noticed a substantial change in your life force,” Elin put in. “I don’t think you’re as mortal as you were when you left. Do you have any idea what could have caused that?”

“Huh. Interesting. Well, it turns out that Gaea grows magic bananas that work a lot like the golden apples in Asgard.”

“What’s a banana?” Tina asked curiously.

“Wait, you stole some?” Cerise exclaimed. “I want one!”

“It’s a kind of fruit that doesn’t grow in Europe,” I told Tina. “And no, I didn’t steal any. I didn’t even know what they were, until Mara gave me one.”

Everyone looked a bit startled at that.

“She must really like you,” Tina observed.

I shrugged. “She’s kind of a mess. I think she’s interested, but her family problems are as bad as it gets. Her mother’s holding her immortality hostage, the brothers she grew up with are a bunch of incestuous rapists, and she’s so desperate for her father’s approval that she’ll happily help him murder everyone in Europe.”

Cerise and Avilla exchanged a speculative look.

“We were wondering if it was something like that,” Avilla said. “But, her own brother?”

“More than one of them,” I corrected. “Gaea set things up so that would happen on purpose. I’m not sure if she’s just a cruel bitch, or if there’s some devious purpose to it all. Either way, Mara’s a long way from being over it.”

“We have to help her,” Tina declared.

“I’d like to,” Avilla agreed. “But I’m not sure it’s wise. There’s not much to be done for people who aren’t right in the head, and she’s very powerful. If she ever has a breakdown, or just has a bad day and lashes out, people could die.”

Elin sighed. “I agree with you, Avilla. She’s a risk, and an added complication to what is already a quite complicated situation. But can we really turn her away, if she comes to us for help? If she has truly endured such a horror, and come out of it unbroken, I can’t help but feel sympathy for her.”

“Sounds like we’re moving on to the heavy subjects,” Cerise said. “Good timing, because I’m completely stuffed. How about we take this discussion to the ritual chamber?”

“It has the best wards,” Avilla agreed.

It was also isolated and soundproof, so we’d be able to keep anyone from overhearing us. If there was anywhere we could make plans without being spied on, it was there.

“So, what all do we need to talk about?” I asked once the doors were safely sealed.

“Can you tell us more about how the mission went?” Avilla said. “I didn’t dare ask before, but it should be safe to talk here.”

“Well, I planted the device. If it worked right the andregi won’t have any more sleeping warriors to wake, so they’ll stop getting reinforcements any day now. There were a couple of complications, though.”

I went on to describe Brand’s disastrous raid on the Halls of Slumber, and my own encounter with Mara. Elin still seemed a little miffed about that, but Cerise and Tina were all smiles.

“Do you think we can make an ally of her?” Avilla sked.

“Yes, assuming we want to take the risk. She’s pretty attached to her father’s side of the family, so I don’t think she’s going to turn on them. But on a personal level she’s desperate for companionship, and I think we connected. Besides, she’s already asked for my help with something that’s pretty important to her. It seems she’s about to have a little sister, and she’s trying to find some way to keep the poor girl from growing up the way she did.”

That required more explanation, of course. By the time I’d finished the tale Elin had reluctantly come around to lobbying in Mara’s favor.

“This will, however, be quite dangerous,” she observed. “If Gaea is pregnant she will likely avoid battle, and stealing a child from her would not be easy. I don’t know how we could hide the girl for any length of time.”

“Hiding isn’t going to work,” I said. “The only way we survive getting involved in this, is if Gaea dies before Ragnarok is over.”

They all stared at me in shocked silence for a long moment.

“Can you kill a goddess, Daniel?” Tina asked timidly.

“Not by myself,” I admitted. “But I’m sure the Aesir will be doing everything they can to take her down. What we need to do is watch, make preparations, and be ready to strike when the opportunity presents itself. Cerise, Elin, who worships Gaea these days?”

“Mostly just her children,” Cerise said. “Goblins, trolls, hags and ape men.”

“So far as I am aware there are no human cults who honor her,” Elin agreed. “Nor do the elves or dwarves pay her homage. She has rejected all but the most primitive worshipers for ages now.”

“That’s good. The andregi live in Skogheim. What about the rest of those races?”

Cerise stretched out across the collection of pillows and blankets that covered the floor of the ritual chamber, and put her head in Avilla’s lap. “Most of them live here on Midgard, but I think I’ve heard something about goblins in Jotunheim before. Elin?”

The delicate faerie settled herself on a pile of pillows beside me, and frowned in thought. “Yes, I believe you are correct. Hags live in the wilder swamps and woods of Europe, while goblins and trolls inhabit the mountains. Goblin tribes are also found in the mountains of Jotunheim, and possibly the jungles of Skogheim. They’re hardy creatures, and very difficult to eradicate.”

“Is there anything you don’t know?” Tina asked her.

“Many things,” Elin admitted.

“If you say so. Here, let me take this down for you while you smart people talk.” Tina started working on Elin’s hair, removing the ornaments that were woven into her hairdo and brushing it out.

“Thank you, dear. Daniel, are you relying on the Julian hypothesis of divine power here? Because I must caution you that no firm link has ever been demonstrated between a god’s power and the numbers of his worshipers.”

“No, it’s not that simple,” I said. “Gods don’t get their power from worshipers. But I know a little bit about why it’s so hard to kill a god, beyond just the fact that they’re powerful. A church is one of the things that they use to anchor themselves to this plane of existence, and a goddess who doesn’t have one anymore is a lot easier for the other gods to kill.”

Cerise chuckled. “That’s one way to get the job done. Tina, these are serious secrets of the gods here, so don’t ever talk about them outside this room. Alright?”

“My lips are sealed,” the catgirl replied.

“Good. We’d need to make sure her sons die too, and scour Skogheim clean of ape men somehow. I don’t know how we’d pull that off.”

“Neither do I,” I said. “But once again, the Aesir are already working on it. I’m not sure what Brand was really doing there, but I don’t think it was as simple as a botched raid. He had some kind of magic device implanted under his skin, and the more I think about it the more convinced I am that he let himself get captured.”

Elin nodded thoughtfully. “Odin is known as a crafty god. It would be quite in character for him to rely on some form of subterfuge to eliminate the threat of the andregi, or to somehow neutralize Gaea.”

“I don’t think even Odin can just ‘neutralize’ an elder goddess,” Avilla commented. “But that raid has given us a more immediate complication to deal with. Daniel, Prince Caspar seems to be dead. He led most of Kozalin’s best knights through the Dark Portal on that raid, and only a handful of them returned.”

“Oh. So, who’s in charge of the city now?” I asked.

“That’s the problem. Pelagia tells me there’s no one in the city with enough support to take over, and with the king besieged again he’s in no position to enforce a decree. There are four dukes in town, all of about the same standing, and they spent most of the afternoon arguing with each other about what to do next. The Conclave isn’t likely to take orders from any of them, and neither will what’s left of the church.”

“Great. What about the city government?”

“The mayor died in the devourer attack, along with most of the city council. With all the chaos of the earthquake and invasion they haven’t managed to replace them, so for now each guild and district is running itself.”

“I hear there are some rabble-rousers working the refugee shelters too,” Cerise said. “Blaming the nobles for the food shortage, and getting the young men all worked up. I’m not sure who they’re working for, but I bet there’s some kind of uprising coming.”

“The prince was also the one responsible for treating with the faerie,” Elin pointed out. “The Summer Queen won’t deign to meet with a man who isn’t royalty, so without him to carry on the negotiations there’s scant hope of aid from that quarter.”

I sighed. “So what you’re telling me is, Kozalin is about to fall apart?”

They all nodded.

“Perhaps a miracle will occur, and all the city’s factions will come together under a single banner,” Elin said. “But the chances of that are slim. The nobles will not follow a wizard, the wizards will not follow a noble, the commoners are restive and the church serves only the gods. Without a royal to unite the city’s factions, I fear Kozalin will soon descend into chaos.”

Chapter 2

The next day I paid Tavrin a visit to start working out plans for Nethwillin’s new home. The dark elves had been amazingly helpful since they’d moved to my island, especially after I’d appointed their clan head as my new castellan. But while they were capable traders I’d recently discovered that they were basically a ninja clan as well, so I figured it would be smart to give them as many reasons as possible to be loyal. They’d spent a thousand years grappling with a serious infertility problem caused by Midgard’s low ambient mana levels, so I figured building them a refuge where that problem didn’t apply should be good for morale.

Tavrin showed me a light spell he wanted to use that produced a spectrum similar to Svartalfheim’s sun, a blue-white glow barely half as bright as normal sunlight. There was a lot of ultraviolet in it, which might explain something about their complexion.

“Your human retainers are going to get sunburned pretty easily under this light,” I pointed out. “They’re all northerners.”

“Yes, some of our older texts mention that problem. Humans will acclimate if their exposure is gradual, correct?”

“Depends on what part of the world you got their ancestors from. Most people will build up a tan if you increase their exposure gradually, but sometimes northern tribes lose that ability. You’ll need to keep an eye out for people who just sunburn repeatedly, and never adjust. But if it does come up I think I can fix it.”

We had to work out how high to push the mana level in their habitat, and then there were a lot of smaller details about the layout and facilities. I was basically just going to build some big rooms and let the elves handle all the detail work, but we still had to agree on an overall design. We were working through the details when a servant poked her head into Tavrin’s office to let us know I had a visitor.

“He says he’s the harbormaster,” she told me. “There doesn’t seem to be an emergency, so we’ve put him in one of the waiting rooms.”

“Harbormaster Lund is out of bed this early? Interesting. Can you let him know I’ll be down in a few minutes? I think we’re almost done here.”

“Of course, milord.”

I spent a few minutes hashing things out with Tavrin before I took my leave. I was surprised at how awkward it made the situation, though. I didn’t want to keep Lund waiting forever like some self-important asshole, but I also didn’t want Tavrin to think I was more concerned with some human outsider than I was with taking care of his clan. Ugh, politics. I guess this is why important people normally have someone managing their appointments.

The harbormaster seemed years older than when last we’d met. There was more gray in his hair, and he’d lost weight as well. He jumped to his feet when I entered the waiting room, and bowed.

“Good day to you, lord wizard. Thank you for seeing me on such short notice. I’m sure you must be a very busy man these days.”

“For every problem I solve, three more pop up,” I agreed. “How have you been?”

“Holding on, milord. If not for those iron buildings you made I likely wouldn’t be here, though. When Hel’s ships attacked the harbor they docked right by my house, and we barely got out ahead of them. We bribed our way into a shelter, and then did it again after the earthquake.”

“Bribed?” I asked.

“The mayor never had a chance to appoint overseers for the shelters,” he explained. “The refugees in each one have taken them over, and chosen their own leaders. With grain rations as short as they are they take a hard line on letting anyone into their space, even in an emergency.”

“I suppose that’s to be expected. Is that what you wanted to talk to me about?”

“It’s only a symptom, milord. I’ve been speaking with the other influential men in the district. The masters of the Mariner’s Guild and the Fishermen’s Association, the grain factors and warehouse magnates, even what’s left of the shipwrights. We can all see the writing on the wall, milord. The truth is the whole city is falling apart, and there doesn’t seem to be anyone who can put it back together.”

“I’m hoping we’ll have a bit of a breather now,” I confided. “The ape men were pretty well wiped out in that last mortar attack, and if another army shows up we’ll just do it again. This leadership mess is another matter, though. There doesn’t seem to be anyone who can step up and take charge.”

“Some of the men thought that might be your cue, milord,” he said cautiously.

“Tempting,” I admitted. “But I don’t think it would work. The Conclave wouldn’t stand for it, and if I got into an argument with them there wouldn’t be much of a city left afterwards.”

“As you say, milord. Most likely that means the city will splinter, though. We don’t dare try to reconvene the city council, because that would just force things to come to a head. So the leaders over in the Military District will all look to the nobles for direction, the ones in the Wizard’s Quarter will turn to the Conclave, and so on.”

That made sense. Of course, the Trade District didn’t really have a local power center to turn to, and the Harbor District…

Oh. Well, now I understood why Lund was here.

“It doesn’t sound like the Harbor District has anything you could call a unified government,” I observed.

Lund frowned unhappily at that. “Not as such, no. I’ve gotten the guilds all pulling together, but that doesn’t account for the whole district. The refugees keep to themselves, and the fishermen have all banded together to take over a warehouse down in West End. There’s the Harbor Watch as well, but they haven’t been much use since the earthquake.”

“Why is that?” I asked. “I imagine you must know their commander.”

“Unfortunately he died in the earthquake. The men elected one of their sergeants to take over, but they haven’t been paid since the mayor died. They’re demanding that someone make good on their payroll before they go back to work.”

I snorted. “Figures. Well, money isn’t going to be a problem, but it sounds like the district has a lot of other issues. How bad is the shelter situation?”

“Bad, milord. About a fourth of the district fell down in the earthquake. That left the survivors packed in like sardines, where they aren’t just out in the cold. We’ve been forced to scavenge the rubble for firewood, and the garrison claimed a lot of timber for the barricades they’ve been throwing up to protect the breaches in the city wall. At this rate folk will start running out in a few weeks, and we’ll all freeze not long after. I might also mention that the city granary is over in the Military District, and things will get tight in a hurry if the nobles stop doling out rations.”

Which would probably happen at some point, when whichever noble ended up in charge of the granary decided to try starving his opponents into submission. In theory I could just seize the granary, but I wasn’t sure the Conclave would stand for that. Besides, then I’d have to guard it, and my men were stretched thin just defending my own citadel. No, I’d have to be a little more subtle than that.

Was I really going to do this?

Yeah, I was. It would be stupid not to.

“I don’t suppose there’s any space left in your fortress, milord?” Lund asked cautiously.

“Only for loyal retainers who can adjust to having strange magical affairs going on around them all the time,” I told him. “We can’t just resettle a crowd of displaced people here. I think it’s better not to put all our eggs in one basket, anyway. If I spent a day throwing up some defensible buildings along the waterfront it would make the whole district a lot more secure.”

“That would certainly help to keep the harbor running,” he agreed. “We’re starting to see loads of food coming up from the south along with the regular trade. Mind you, not many folk can afford to buy at the prices they’re asking. I’m better off than most, and my own means are feeling a bit stretched these days.”

“Oh, I think we can do something about that,” I said. “How do you think it would go over, if you quietly put the word out that I’m willing to take over the payroll for all the city officials in the Harbor District? Maybe we could hire some work crews to clear away rubble and shovel the snow off the streets while we’re at it.”

“I’m sure most everyone would be pleased to accept your generosity, milord. I know I will.”

“Good. I’ll have Tavrin, my castellan, get with you to arrange the details. How hard would it be to set up meetings with all of these independent groups? We need to get everyone working together here as soon as possible.”

“I’m sure I can arrange something, milord.”

Well, that all sounded fairly promising. I stopped by Tavrin’s office to fill him in on the situation, which seemed to amuse him.

“I’m sure we’ll find that the city payroll records have mysteriously vanished,” he said. “But of course we can take their word about what they were being paid.”

I shrugged. “I’m fine with letting everyone give themselves a raise, actually. They’ll spend most of it on food, and the profits will keep those merchant captains making the trip to deliver more. Just make sure we don’t end up paying the watch captain for troops who don’t really exist, or anything dumb like that.”

“That much I can manage. Are you planning to let Lund put himself in charge of the district?”

“I’m not sure yet. He’s corrupt, but he’s also pretty competent and he tries to take care of his people. We’ll need to do something with the leaders of these other groups, though, or they’ll wind up causing problems. I’m tempted to set up some kind of local governing council so we can give everyone a seat. Trouble is, then we’ll end up having endless meetings about everything instead of just getting the job done.”

“Make it an advisory council,” he suggested. “You’ll need to be involved in everything anyway at first, since so many of their problems will require magical solutions. Once you’ve spent some time working with them you’ll be able to pick out the best man to put in charge. Then he can deal with the council meetings.”

“Not a bad plan,” I mused. “I may do that.”

My next stop was just a few doors down the hall, where Pelagia had set up her office. She’d already found herself a secretary, a nervous-looking young man who immediately jumped up and ushered me in.

Pelagia was wearing a proper dress today, instead of armor or that gauzy negligee thing she’d shown off when we first met. But the close-fitting bodice did nothing to hide her spectacular figure, and the skirt only came to mid-thigh. The way she jumped to her feet with a huge smile the moment she saw me didn’t help with the urge to throw her over her desk and have my way with her.

“Hello, Pelagia. How’s my favorite nymph today?”

“Daniel! Good morning, my lord. I’m well enough, although I fear the tasks you’ve set me are proving quite formidable.”

The secretary hurriedly vacated the room, closing the door behind him. I raised an eyebrow. “What’s with him?”

“Oh, Edvin is a lover of men. I believe I make him nervous, but it’s better than the alternative. I’d never be able to keep my hands off of him all day if he were normal.”

I chuckled. “That’s one way to do it. So, I’ve got a job for you. Think you can find a merchant who’d be willing to sell us a few tons of grain on the sly?”

Instead of returning to her seat Pelagia just perched on the edge of her desk. “Willing to? Certainly. All we need to do is offer an outrageous price for it. Able to? That will be more difficult. The granary is heavily guarded now, and a line of wagons is hard to miss.”

“I suspect the elves can solve that problem for us,” I pointed out.

“Oh, that’s right. Nethwillin does a lot of smuggling, don’t they? They’re bound to have suitable magic.”

“They have a collection of bags and boxes that are a lot bigger on the inside than they look, and they’re pretty good at being stealthy. I’m sure Tavrin could figure out a way to smuggle the grain across the city easily enough. I’m going to be building a granary of our own on the island this afternoon, so we have someplace to put it.”

“Very well, my lord. I shall arrange it.”

That was good to hear, but good god this woman was distracting. She’d put her hands down on the desk behind her, and now she was arching her back slightly. Her mountainous breasts were nearly a match for Tina’s, and her position made it almost impossible to tear my gaze off them. Especially when her nipples started to tent the thin fabric of her dress. She couldn’t really be getting that turned on just from talking to me, could she?

Of course she could. She was a nymph.

“I hear you’re also arranging a revel, whatever that is?”

“An evening of celebration, for our new patron. You will attend, won’t you, my lord?” She licked her lips, and took a deep breath that left the lacings of her dress straining to contain her assets.

It went against my own cultural hang-ups, but it was about time I got over those. So instead of looking away and pretending I hadn’t noticed, I took a step closer and put my hand on her thigh.

“Of course I’ll be there. I wouldn’t want your girls to think I was rejecting them or something. Although you’re not making it easy to wait.”

She hooked an ankle around my leg to pull me closer, and ran her hands up my chest. “We don’t have to wait, Daniel.”

I cupped her cheek in my hand. “Some things are worth doing right, Pelagia. Besides, I’ve got an officer’s meeting in half an hour. That isn’t nearly enough time.”

She groaned, and laid her forehead against my chest. “Ugh! You don’t know what torture it is for a nymph to resist temptation, Daniel. Please, promise me you aren’t just teasing? You’ll really attend, and seal our bonds properly? No evasions, or last minute rejections?”

“I promise, Pelagia. I’ll admit, I was a little nervous about you at first. But you’ve been nothing but helpful, and I think it’s about time I listened to all the people who have been telling me not to worry. Although I doubt you want things between us to be like they are with Cerise and Corinna.”

She shook her head sadly.

“My heart is far too old for such innocent games, and I fear my scars run too deep. As well, you have your ladies to attend to, and I have no wish to upset the balance of your coven. But nymphs were not meant to bear the burden of leadership, and it weighs heavily upon me. I would be grateful for the opportunity to lay it down from time to time, in the arms of a man who has no need to take advantage of my moments of weakness.”

Somehow, my arms had ended up around her. I hugged her gently.

“I understand, Pelagia. Friends with benefits sounds pretty good to me, too.”

“They have a term for it in your land? How unusual. I have not seen a society where humans admitted to such things since Rome fell.”

“Yeah, I’m from a strange place. Still can’t tell you anything about it, though.”

“I did not ask. I have no need to pry into my lord’s secrets, especially when they involve Dark Hecate. I would rather turn my imagination to more pleasant ends. Tomorrow evening, then? Come to the grove an hour before sunset, and we shall show you the hospitality of the Bloody Thorns. Feasting and performances, dance and song, and all our arts of pleasure.”

“As long as none of those arts involve shedding blood. I’m not going to judge what you do with each other, but seeing pretty girls in pain is a major turn off for me.”

She gave me a pleased look. “I’m glad to hear it. A proper lord of the land should have no need of such contrivances. But be warned, I expect to be properly conquered by the evening’s end.”

I pulled her into a kiss. Her lips were sweet against my tongue, like some exotic tropical fruit. They parted at my touch, and I plundered her mouth with unhurried thoroughness. Controlling the kiss with a hand in her hair, listening to the throaty sounds of delight that she made. Finally I released her lips, and gazed into her eyes across a distance of inches.

“You won’t be disappointed,” I told her.

I let her go, and stepped away. She swayed towards me for a moment before she regained control of herself, and slumped back onto her desk. “Tease. You’d best bring a full measure of your sorcery of endurance, for you shall surely need it. Now get out of here, before I lose what vestige of self-control I yet retain.”

“I could always tie you to the desk-”

“Go! Or I shall not be responsible for my actions!”

I went. I had to stop and adjust myself once the door was closed, but it was worth it to get the best of her. Once I would have been intimidated by the prospect of being the guest of honor at some kind of nature spirit orgy, but these days I was confident that I could handle it. Too bad my next appointment wasn’t going to be as fun.

Demetrios had set up a war room while I was away, and while it wasn’t fancy the elder satyr had made sure it had the essentials. A map of Kozalin and the surrounding region was spread across a large table in the middle of the room, and decorated with little wooden tokens representing the local military forces. A second table held a map of Varmland, with tokens marking settlements that were still holding out and the monster forces that threatened them. On one wall a rough sketch of Europe was taking shape, although our information from that far afield was pretty limited.

Demetrios and Captain Rain were already there, along with a couple of the sergeants. Tavrin arrived moments after I did, with his daughter Sefwin on his heels.

“So, how’s our military situation looking?” I asked.

“Improving, but still damnably poor,” Demetrios replied. “That’s what I wanted to discuss. With the city threatening to fragment we have several opportunities, but also a lot of problems.”

“I know,” I agreed. “First things first. The island.”

Demetrios nodded to Tavrin, who fielded the question.

“Black Island is currently well secured against a conventional assault by troops of ordinary skill, which includes most of our likely opponents. My people are implementing security measures to prevent infiltration by goblins or andregi airborne commandos, and your wards will keep out ghosts and spirits. But the regular garrison is only two hundred men, and half of them are barely trained. Our military security rests on the power of the mortars combined with the obstacle represented by the walls of the Black Fortress, and any enemy who can bypass those defenses will easily overwhelm our troops.

“The supply situation is considerably better, at least for our own people. The first crops of peas, beans and radishes have come in, with wheat and barley soon to follow, and we’re now harvesting crops a bit faster than we eat them. I’ve set up regular lumbering runs to keep our carpenters supplied with wood, and we’re stockpiling lumber and stone against future needs. Clothing is still in short supply, but our first crop of flax should be ready to harvest next week. So our truly essential needs are being met internally, and we needn’t worry about starvation in the event of a siege.

“Our greatest threat is from Kozalin. We have hundreds of civilians visiting the market down on the street level every day now, and their numbers are growing as word gets around. Those stores you set up to sell conjured building stones and mass-produced lights are making money hand over fist, and so are the farmers at the produce market. But it’s impossible to vet so many people, and we don’t have the manpower to keep all the street level exits properly guarded. A clever enemy could easily infiltrate the island with troops mixed in among the shoppers, and cause havoc.”

“Elin’s clinic is a potential target,” Sefwin put in. “I only have twenty agents, so I can’t devote a lot of personnel to security there without exposing the palace. She always has two elves with her when she’s healing, but I’ve had to rely on garrison troops to keep an eye on the place when it’s empty. I don’t have any confidence at all in their ability to spot hidden interlopers setting up traps.”

“How secure would you say the palace is now?” I asked.

“Not as safe as it looks,” she replied. “The fortifications are excellent, and having a sealed environment helps as well. But Avilla’s maids are a serious security risk, which the psychological aspect of your wards doesn’t fully address. The sheer size of the place is also an obstacle, since it will slow down our response to any disturbance. It helps that your ladies can all defend themselves, of course, but I still don’t consider the situation adequate for protecting a pregnant woman.”

Captain Rain shook his head. “You elves see assassins everywhere. No queen of Varmland has ever been as safe as Lord Black’s ladies, Sefwin. But the news on our field company is much the same. I’ve managed to assemble a force of two hundred men, with rifles and enough training that we can count on them to point the things in the right direction. Only half of them are proper soldiers, though, and their morale is a bit shaky. We don’t have enough skimmers to transport them either, and I wouldn’t like to get into a serious battle beyond the reach of the mortars.”

Vehicles. Right. That was going to be a hell of a project. It took several hours to build something as complex as an armored skimmer by hand, and we needed at least twenty of them. I’d had some ideas about building a factory enchantment to make the things instead, but getting all the mechanical parts to fit together properly would make it a big project. I wasn’t sure when I’d have time to tackle it.

“Alright, so we have some challenges. What do we do about them?”

“Against the infiltration threat, I’d say the key problem is that our human soldiers are simply too vulnerable to dirty tricks,” Demetrios said. “We need to make them harder to fool, or at least harder to disable. Better senses, basic magical defenses, perhaps something to make them more durable or harder to target for a quiet takedown. It doesn’t need to be powerful, just effective enough to upset an assassin’s plans.”

“Some of that should be doable,” I mused. “Think you’d get any volunteers for a wolfen conversion?”

“A few,” Demetrios replied.

“Not many,” Captain Rain added. “A man has to be desperate or crazy to agree to something like that, and the men aren’t feeling so desperate these days. Something about the size of these walls. But Gronir keeps asking among the refugees, and I know his list has at least thirty names on it.”

“That brings us around to the morale issue,” Demetrios said. “As Marcus observed, a lot of our troops are too green for comfort. We’re training them as hard as we can, but we all know it takes a few months for that to pay off. Until then, I think the best thing we can do to ensure they’ll stand their ground is to give them something to protect. There are plenty of desperate young women in Kozalin right now, so it shouldn’t be hard to arrange for a few hundred young men to find themselves wives.”

“That just trades one problem for another,” Captain Rain grumbled. “They’ll be forever shirking their duties for a chance to sneak off to their women.”

“I’ve seen that handled pretty well,” I said. “It’s just a matter of setting up the right incentives. First we set up a special housing area for the families of each unit, so their wives are all neighbors and gossip with each other. Then we make being absent without leave a fairly serious offense, but arrange our schedules so that each man gets to spend a day or two with his family every week. Make the standard training schedule five days of work followed by two days of leave, or something like that.”

“I suppose that might work, my lord. I’m not sure how to arrange the matchmaking, though. Our boys don’t have a lot of contact with the refugees, and most of them are a bit young to be looking for wives.”

“That’s an easy one,” Demetrios said. “Pelagia is already recruiting craftsmen and farmers from the refugee shelters. We’ll just let her recruit hopeful would-be brides as well. Set up a barracks and living area for them, tell them they’ve got three weeks to find a husband before we kick them back out, and let the men visit when they’re on leave. They’ll be hitched before you can blink.”

I chuckled. “You know, Brand was trying to get me to take in two or three women for every man on the island. Maybe we should let them have more than one bride?”

The men all laughed at that. Sefwin groaned.

“Two women sharing a man who’s gone most of the time, with no magic to prevent jealousy? Not unless you want them murdering each other, Daniel. Let the sergeants take concubines if they want, but the enlisted men are way too young and stupid to handle that kind of thing.”

“She’s right about that,” Demetrios agreed. “The civilians are another matter, though. There’s a lot to be said for taking in extra women while we can. I think Black Island has a good chance of surviving this trial, but the rest of the city is another matter.”

“Yeah, that’s the kicker,” I agreed. “Between the earthquake and the andregi attacks the city defenses are in sorry shape, and I don’t see that changing anytime soon. We’re going to have monsters infiltrating to prey on the civilians soon, and who knows what the next big threat will be. The question is, what do we do about it?”

“The main threat to us would be a Great Beast,” Demetrios said. “I don’t think we have anything that can kill a monster like that. The cannons aren’t powerful enough, and the mortars would have trouble hitting a moving target.”

“Desperate mobs will eventually be an issue,” Tavrin added. “We need more manpower to ensure we can deal with them appropriately. Some measures to limit the number of outsiders visiting the island would also be wise. Perhaps we could set up a market at the other end of the causeway?”

“Yeah, that sounds like a good idea. What about recruiting opportunities? There are so many troops in the city, there’s bound to be a company or two who’ve gotten orphaned.”

“I have a few contacts among the officers,” Captain Rain said. “I can put the word out, if you want to make an offer. But the nobles will all be thinking the same thing, and most men feel a bit nervous about working for a wizard. It could be expensive.”

“We have money,” I pointed out. “Actually, that’s something I wanted to mention. Since we’ve got plenty of gold in the treasury I want to give everyone a raise. The best way to keep ships coming into the harbor is to make sure they make a fat profit, so I want to give our people enough money to afford the inflated prices they’re charging.”

That was a popular idea.

The meeting dragged on for longer than I would have liked. There were endless details to arrange, and a lot of decisions the men wanted my approval on. Understandable, since we hadn’t been working together very long, but it all took time.

Demetrios was a bit surprised at my plan to take over the Harbor District, although he seemed to understand my reasoning.

“We need a recruiting pool, and a place to put uncertain allies,” I explained. “The only people I’m going to let live on the island are the ones we can trust to fight on our side if the city turns against us. But it takes time for people to make up their minds about things like that, and more time for us to recruit them. So we can’t just close our doors and let the city go to hell.

“I’m thinking I’ll put up some fortified buildings around the district, and put one of the local big shots in charge of each of them. They can move the local businesses that are still running inside them, and organize militias to defend them the next time the city is attacked. With some basic defensive enchantments they’ll be proof against earthquakes, frost wraiths and monster raids.”

“That will certainly reduce their casualties,” Demetrios agreed. “Assaulting a district dotted with little fortresses like that would be a nightmare. But I’d suggest repairing the breaches in the wall as well. It will help control movement in and out of the district, and limit the number of monsters that can sneak in. Not to mention that it’s a clear way to mark the limits of your territory.”

What I wanted to do was repair the city’s outer wall, and maybe melt the moat while I was at it. But if I did that the nobles would think I was staking claim to the entire city, and that would only cause more trouble. Besides, I didn’t have time to rebuild the whole city. I had too many other urgent projects on my plate.

Chapter 3

Making more wolfen turned out to be a tricky problem. Originally I’d hoped that my flesh sorcery would be up to the job, provided I could get a decent look at the magic involved. Cerise had helpfully bent her power-stealing abilities to the task of collecting a sample of felwolf magic, which we’d picked up a bit over a week ago while we were testing out our new flight abilities. So I sent for a couple of wolfen volunteers, and settled in to spend an evening comparing their physiology to the magic in Cerise’s sample.

Unfortunately, it didn’t work. Thanks to my mana sorcery it was easy enough to figure out what was in the sample, but the important parts were more mystical than biological. My flesh sorcery was good at moving atoms around, but not so great at inventing new forms of innate magic. If I wanted to duplicate the enchantment that made the wolfen I’d have to start by turning some poor sap into a miniature felwolf, and then spend a few months experimenting on him.

Yeah, not going there. People already thought I was an evil wizard. No need to prove them right.

It was Cerise who finally pointed out that we already had a way to bypass that problem. The next morning we pooled our efforts to render a sample of felwolf essence into physical form, and then headed down to the kitchen.

Avilla examined the vial full of dark, syrupy liquid dubiously. “This doesn’t look very appetizing.”

“You don’t need very much,” Cerise said. “A teaspoon of that stuff is about what you’d get from a felwolf heart with your normal ritual.”

“Oh, so it’s concentrated? That might work, then. Give me a moment.”

She carefully measured out a few drops of liquid, and diluted it with a cup of milk. Then she sniffed it like a wine snob sampling some exotic vintage, and tasted a tiny sip.

“Strong, but not unpleasant,” she declared. “There’s a bit of an aftertaste, but I can fix that. Use it in a sauce over red meat, or as seasoning for a hearty stew. I suppose I could serve feasts to make more wolfen now and then, if you can supply me with enough essence. Will that take a lot of hunting?”

“Oh, I can make more,” I explained. “My mana sorcery is good enough for that. I just couldn’t quite make the jump from creating felwolf essence to transforming people safely. So we figured I’ll just make you a bottle of the stuff that refills itself automatically, and then you can make us as many wolfen as we want.”

She stared at me incredulously for a moment. Then she giggled, and shook her head.

“Only you, Daniel. Do you realize how precious an ingredient like that is for me? An unlimited supply of even one essence will make me the most powerful hearth witch in Europe.”

“I think you were already there, honeydew,” Cerise told her. “Have you shown Daniel your new trick?”

“Nope,” I answered for her. “I haven’t been around much. Have you started animating the utensils or something?”

“Better,” Cerise said. “Come on, show him already!”

“Alright, alright, if you insist. Really, it’s not that impressive. I’ve just been deepening my claim on our home.”

Avilla took a step back into the cabinets that lined the wall behind her, and vanished. Just like a dryad stepping into her tree.

“That’s pretty cool,” I observed. “Can you still hear us like that?”

“Yes,” came Avilla’s voice from out in the dining room. I turned to find her standing on the other side of the breakfast bar, with a proud little smile on her lips.

“Traveling, too? How far can you go?”

“This is my limit right now. But my reach grows a little further every day. Give me a few weeks, and I’ll be stepping across the palace and back whenever I like.”

“Normally that takes about twenty years of daily rituals, and it doesn’t reach more than a dozen paces from the hearth,” Cerise pointed out. “My girl’s already stronger than her granny ever was.”

Avilla blushed prettily. “Thank you, kitten. Just remember that raw power isn’t everything. I have a long way to go before I can match granny’s subtle hand with enchantments, and I have no one to learn from. A few more hearth witches have turned up among the refugees as they trickle in, but so far they’ve all been young apprentices like Mari.”

“At least you’ve still got your recipe book,” Cerise pointed out. “Hey, Daniel, think we could swing back north to pick up honeydew’s implements sometime soon?”

I winced. “Ouch. I’d love to, but that would probably take three days with the Intrepid. I’ve got some ideas for a faster flying machine, but I need to come up with a way to supply our troops with skimmers before I can take time for that.”

“It’s alright, Daniel,” Avilla assured me. “To be honest, when we left the house I didn’t think we’d ever be back. I’ve already started to make replacements, and with the power you’ve given me it won’t take nearly as long as when granny made hers. I’m sure rescuing villages is a much better use of the airship’s time.”

“I guess there’s no telling where we might find an old granny who’s really an experienced witch,” Cerise pointed out. “Just don’t hesitate to tell us if you realize you’re missing something you can’t replace, okay? We’ll make sure you’re taken care of, sweetie.”

Avilla walked through the bar like it wasn’t there, and pulled Cerise and I both into a group hug.

“You’re too good to me, both of you,” she said. “Thank you. That means a lot to me. But really, I’m fine. In fact, I’m going to have some fun surprises for the Yule feast.”

“The what?”

“Do they not have that where you’re from?” Cerise asked. “It’s the biggest holiday of the year, and it’s only a few weeks away. Come to think of it, we should arrange something for the troops too. It would be good for morale.”

“My to-do list never seems to get any shorter,” I said. “At this rate I’ll have to invent time travel just to keep up.”

“Maybe Elin can help with that,” Cerise joked. “The dryad groves are practically turning into faerie realms with all the power we’re feeding them, and I’m sure you’ve heard the stories about how strange time can be in faerie. Of course, knowing Pelagia I doubt you’d ever get any work done there.”

“Yeah, somehow I don’t think that would turn out very well,” I agreed.

“Then again, I could go for a few years of banging hot nature spirits in between our weekly disasters.”

“Slut,” Avilla said affectionately. “You’d spend your whole life in bed if you could get away with it.”

“You complaining?” Cerise pulled her lover into a kiss. Avilla squeaked in surprise, but didn’t put up much resistance until Cerise’s tail started to snake up her thigh. Then she pulled away, and swatted Cerise on the butt.

“Stop that! I have work to do, kitten. Go play with your dryads if you’re so worked up.”

Cerise pulled away with a giggle. “Nah, I think I’ll seduce Elin. She’s been getting wrapped up in her books again, so someone needs to remind her that she’s not alone anymore. You’re done with me for now, right Daniel?”

“I don’t know, I’m tempted to get in on this Elin seduction business.”

“You’d better save your strength for tonight,” she advised. “You don’t want to disappoint Pelagia.”

“Yeah, you’re probably right. Go on and have your fun, then. I can take this from here. Avilla, I’ll have Gronir handle all the organizing for wolfen recruits, so you won’t need to do anything but the cooking. I’m sure you two can work out a schedule, and you can add in some of the maids if you want.”

“Alright, Daniel. With a large essence supply I can make a much stronger recipe, so it won’t take long to start seeing results.”

That was one problem out of the way. Could I do something about the other transformations and enhancements I’d been thinking of while I was at it? There was an interesting personal enchantment I’d never used, that would make the subject a lot stronger and more durable than a normal human. But laying enchantments on people is a more delicate process than burning them into a piece of equipment, and I’d never had the luxury of spending a whole day on something like that.

A day of work just to make a single soldier twice as strong wasn’t worth it, but maybe I could make a device that would do the work for me? Something like the factory enchantments I’d been building to make guns and mortar shells? That might work, but the idea of using it on people made me a little nervous. I’d never done anything quite like that before, and a mistake could have nasty side effects.

So I decided to start out with something a lot less complicated. Could I make a device that would apply a simple cosmetic change to the wearer? There were a lot of those I could do with my flesh magic.

An amulet that changed the wearer’s hair color was trivial, but that was just a magical dye job. Making it change their natural color was more complicated, and I found that it was best to give the magic some time to work instead of trying to make the change instant. There were also some interesting complications, like making it smart enough to realize when it was done instead of just re-running the transformation forever. Making it recognize when the wearer already had the desired hair color also seemed like a good idea. Stuff like that turned out to be the hardest part of the exercise, but even so it barely took me an hour.

What would be a good step up from that? Something involving more tissue, and maybe a mass change, but not a full-body effect?

I snickered at the first idea that came to mind. Why not? Avilla had already told me there was a demand for it.

My kitchen goddess was rather bemused when I stopped by her domain again late in the afternoon to present her with a collection of little gold amulets.

“Ask, and ye shall receive,” I said grandly. “But I want you to keep these under lock and key, and be careful about how they get used. Some of them could cause problems if the girls get careless.”

She eyed the handful of amulets cautiously. “How mysterious. What do they do?”

“They’re transformation amulets. Each one has a different effect, but they’re pretty simple to use. Here, let’s start with this one. See the little glowing crystal? It changes the wearer’s hair color to match whatever is showing.”

“Oh, my! That will be very useful,” she exclaimed, taking the amulet and studying it intently. “How do you set the color? Some sort of intent control?”

“Yes, but you have to feed it a little magic while you’re setting it. I did it that way so you can have the maids use it, and they won’t accidentally change the settings. It takes about ten minutes to work, but once it’s done that’s their natural color.”

“Marvelous. I’m surprised you had time to make something so frivolous, though.”

“I’m working my way up to more complicated things,” I told her. “I just figured I might as well make the test pieces something you can use. This next one does the same thing, only with skin tone. Notice it’s got a little ‘S’ engraved on the back, and the other one has an ‘H’? It takes a little longer to work, and you don’t want to take it off before it’s done or the color might not come out even. If you keep it on after it’s finished with the basic change it’ll go on to remove freckles, moles and small scars, so if you’ve got someone who likes her freckles you’ll want to be careful with that.”

“Alright, that will be handy for making some of the girls look exotic. What about the other three?”

I grinned, and held up one of the amulets. “This one makes the wearer’s breasts bigger.”

She giggled. “I knew it!”

“Yeah, I had to go there, didn’t I? It’ll also fix some common problems, like removing stretch marks and making them match if they aren’t quite the same size. It’s a lot slower than the color change amulets, though. It takes about half an hour to make a noticeable difference, but it just keeps working for as long as you wear it. Don’t let anyone wear it to bed, or they’ll end up way too big.”

“I’ll keep that in mind, Daniel. We wouldn’t want to upset Tina.”

“We also don’t want anyone to get suffocated by her own breasts,” I said dryly. “Seriously, most people aren’t going to need more than a couple of hours. But I know women can be picky about these things, and it could take some experimenting to get it just right, so this amulet does the opposite. Notice the engraving says ‘B-’, and the growth amulet says ‘B+’. That way the ones who get carried away can get back down to a reasonable size without having to bother me.”

“How thoughtful. You know, Daniel, that’s one of the things I love about you. You always try to think these things through, and make them work out right for everyone.”

“Um, thanks, I guess? What else would I do?”

“Most wizards would say that people are cheaper than magic,” she pointed out. “Letting a few fools die in mishaps is a lot easier than trying to make your enchantments flawless. But we all know you don’t think that way.”

“No, I have this strange idea that lives are actually valuable,” I replied.

It really got to me sometimes, how little anyone else around here seemed to care about that. I know life is cheap in preindustrial societies, but I don’t have to like it.

“Anyway, this last one is going to need special handling. It turns the wearer into a catgirl.”

A breathless squeak from the other side of the kitchen informed me that we had an audience. A couple of the maids were putting away a load of groceries, and the pantry was easily within earshot.

Avilla smiled indulgently, and raised her voice. “Did you see a mouse, Cami? I hope so, otherwise I’ll have to punish you for eavesdropping again.”

“I’m sorry, Miss Avilla!” One of the maids exclaimed. “I didn’t mean it! I just, I mean, I couldn’t help myself.”

“I know how much you want to be like Tina,” Avilla said. “But you still overstepped. Finish your work, and then go to the training room and wait for me.”

“Yes, Miss Avilla!”

I thought about intervening, but the breathless anticipation in the girl’s reply changed my mind. Instead I raised a sound barrier around the two of us.

“Must not be much of a punishment if she’s looking forward to it that much,” I said.

“Ten swats with the paddle,” Avilla admitted. “Slow, with lots of attention in between, and I usually can’t resist playing with them a little afterwards. I know, I’m a softie.”

“It seems to be working out for you,” I said with a chuckle. “So, anyway. I tuned the catgirl transformation to go with your idea of making exotic maids, so it still leaves them looking pretty close to human. They’ll have the ears and tail, but no fur to speak of. It’s also going to give them better hearing, a much better sense of smell, faster reflexes and enough strength to arm wrestle your average soldier. But it takes most of a day to finish the transformation, and it’s important to keep the amulet on the whole time. If the process ever gets interrupted somehow don’t let them put the amulet back on, and get them to me as soon as you can.”

She frowned. “How dangerous is that?”

“Oh, it isn’t going to kill them or anything. It’s just that the amulet isn’t smart enough to pick back up where it left off, so they could end up with a distorted transformation that doesn’t work right. I don’t think anyone wants to get stuck with an extra pair of cat ears, or a nose so keen she can’t stand to get near the kitchen.”

“I see. That’s not so bad, then. Does it also give them Tina’s, ah, proportions?”

“No, it just gives them some extra physical fitness. I figured anyone who wants to go catgirl can use the other amulets first, to get the cosmetic changes right. Oh, but that’s an important safety issue. I designed these enchantments to work on human women, and they aren’t necessarily safe for anyone else. The wolfen should be fine, but no elves or catgirls. Or you, for that matter. Not that I can see why you’d want to change anything about yourself, since you’re already perfect.”

She playfully swatted my arm. “Oh, you! Don’t start with the flattery when I’m supposed to be keeping my hands off of you. Shouldn’t you be heading down to the grove soon?”

“I know, I know. I’m just going to go change first. What do you wear to a revel, anyway?”

“Something that’s easy to take off?”

“No doubt.”

I turned to go, but she suddenly pulled me back and kissed me.

“Thank you for the gifts, Daniel. I’ll put them to good use.”

I headed back to my room with a smile.

What do you wear to a nature spirit sex party? I pondered that question for a few minutes as I looked over my wardrobe. Avilla had been adding new outfits when I wasn’t looking, and I found that I now had quite a selection. Comfortable lounging robes. Practical work clothes. Fancy formal outfits. There was something appropriate for any normal social function.

Hmm.

Mythology paints nymphs as simple nature spirits, spending all their time dancing naked in woodland groves and leading satyrs on giggling chases through the wilderness. But for all that they seemed to spend half their time naked, the women in Pelagia’s grove tried to be more sophisticated than that. When they did bother with clothes they favored surprisingly elaborate gowns, and Pelagia was always bragging about how refined they were supposed to be. Her ‘girls’ were immortal nymphs and their nearly ageless companions, and in a thousand years even the most flighty of creatures could learn a thing or two.

In the end I decided to dress for a formal ball. That meant a shirt and pants instead of the robes mages usually favored, and a tailored jacket to go over it. The tails on the jacket took some getting used to, and I had to get a maid to help arrange the braid properly. But at least Varmland didn’t seem to have ties.

I knew I’d made the right choice when I reached the entrance to the dryad complex, and found a nymph wearing what had to be a formal dress waiting for me. With a skirt that almost reached her knees and a neckline that barely showed a hint of cleavage, it was the most conservative thing I’d ever seen a nymph wear.

She was still stunning, of course. The thin silk clung to an hourglass figure that would put any centerfold model back home to shame, and her long mane of curly chestnut hair was done up in a complicated arrangement that framed her face and left her delicate neck bare. She even wore earrings, dangly twists of gold set with big green gemstones that matched her eyes.

She favored me with a brilliant smile. “I bid you welcome to an evening of celebration, my lord. May I escort you to the festival?”

I struggled to remember her name, but luckily it came to me.

“Certainly, Xenia. I take it Pelagia has big plans for the evening?”

I offered her my arm, and she took it without making any attempt to get closer.

“Of course, my lord. We haven’t had such cause to celebrate since before the Grove of Bloody Thorns was properly formed. All our best entertainers are going to be part of the show.”

The door I’d come through opened onto the bottom floor of one of the agricultural areas, between the habitats I’d built for Pelagia’s Grove of Bloody Thorns and Corinna’s Fangs of the Forest. I hadn’t been here in weeks, and I found that the dryads had turned it into a garden at some point. The overhead lights were turned off, but there was a grassy path lit by floating balls of green and blue faerie fire. On either side of the path were patches of flowers between tall bushes, all of which had colorful blossoms of their own. It almost looked natural, except that I knew there had been nothing here but bare dirt when I built the place.

“Very nice,” I said. “But doesn’t this make things difficult for the farmers?”

“They use the other doors,” she replied. “This one is closest to your palace, so Pelagia and Corinna decided to make it look nice. Now please, my lord, no more talk about practical things. Tonight is a time for relaxation and enjoyment, not work.”

“Alright. What would you like to talk about?”

The path crossed a little stone bridge in the deceptively deep stream Elin and I had carved out between the two groves, and I saw that someone had made a few additions to the structure. A mass of vines grew up around the posts at either end of the bridge, and twined together atop them to form miniature tree shapes adorned with tiny balls of faerie fire.

We crossed the bridge, and started down the path to Pelagia’s grove.

“Well, Nomiki wanted me to thank you for convincing Lady Elin that our offers of massage services aren’t just a plot to seduce her.”

“You’re welcome. I think you had a good idea there. That girl seriously needs to learn how to relax. Although I doubt Nomiki would pass up a chance if it came up. I’ve seen how she looks at Elin behind her back.”

Xenia giggled. “Well, of course not. Lady Elin is quite beautiful, and she helped you build our new home. We’re going to seduce her quite thoroughly one day. But it’s clear that she isn’t ready for that yet, so for now we’re simply working to get her comfortable with us. Thankfully your other ladies are more open about such things.”

“Oh?”

“Oh, yes. Avilla asked for a demonstration a few days ago, and she was a lot of fun. I think she’s working out a plan to have us ambush Cerise and pamper her into a pliable puddle of bliss. And Tina is just a joy! She came wandering down here wanting to meet everyone, and spent the better part of a day just visiting. There’s not an ounce of human hesitation in that one.”

“No, she’s pretty enthusiastic. She told me once that if she’s going to be one of us sinful heathens, she wants to try out all the sins and figure out which ones she likes. I can’t imagine her reaction to some of the things you girls do, though.”

“She was fascinated by the restraints and costumes,” Xenia confided. “I put on a little show with Hela, just some light bondage and paddling, and she couldn’t take her eyes off of us. It was adorable.”

We came to the end of the path. It opened out into a grassy clearing, surrounded by the tall trees of the grove. A crowd of beautiful women filled the space, all of them dressed for a party. Lean, athletic dryads in miniskirts and halter tops, their weapons put away for the evening. Taller, more mature hamadryads mingling with the outrageously curvy nymphs, all dressed in formal gowns like Xenia’s. The naga I’d seen once before, who was draped in so many gold necklaces, bracelets, earrings and waist chains that they almost hid the fact that she was naked.

Pelagia emerged from the crowd, and enveloped me in a warm hug. “Welcome, Daniel! I’m so glad you could make it. Ladies,” she said, turning and raising her voice. “Our guest of honor has arrived.”

The murmur of conversation died instantly, and the whole crowd turned to face me. Then they all curtsied in unison, and smiled at me.

“Welcome, my lord.”

Pelagia claimed my free arm, and smothered it between her soft breasts as she went up on tiptoe to murmur in my ear. “Every one of my girls is eager to serve you in any way you desire.”

I couldn’t help it. I was hard as a rock already.

“But first, let us show off our less predictable talents,” she went on, louder. “Come, we’ve prepared a place of honor for you. Have a seat, and sample our wine while you enjoy the show. Xenia will ensure your comfort.”

“I’m looking forward to it.”

Xenia led me to a large cushion surrounded by soft grass, where a pair of dryads waited with wine and a bowl of fruit. They settled me on the cushion, with a dryad curled up on either side of me. Xenia settled herself behind me, and they pushed me back to recline with my head on her mountainous breasts.

“Wine, milord?” One of the dryads asked.

“Or food?” The other said.

“Both,” I replied. “But go easy on the wine. I wouldn’t want to overdo it, and miss something. ”

“Of course, milord,” said the dryad with the fruit bowl. “Just relax, and let us take care of you.”

I started to say something else, and she popped a grape in my mouth. Then wine girl leaned in to hold a goblet to my lips, incidentally pressing her perky little breasts into my shoulder.

Well, guess I wasn’t going to need my hands here. I let them settle around the dryads’ waists, and they practically purred at the contact. Fruit girl fed me an orange wedge.

Around us the rest of the crowd was taking seats on the grass, facing a low wooden stage. Pelagia took to the stage as the crowd settled, and looked out over the group with a brilliant smile.

“My dear friends and beloved sisters, we are gathered here this evening to celebrate a momentous occasion. For the first time since the fall of Olympus, our grove stands on hallowed ground!”

There was a burst of applause, and several cheers. Pelagia waited for the noise to die down before she continued.

“For ages we nymphs were playthings of the gods. They lent us a faint reflection of their power, feeding our cravings for protection and support. But they had little care for their toys, and we often suffered under their rule.

“Then came the fall, and for long centuries we were left to fend for ourselves. Hunted by men and gods alike for our beauty and compliant nature, with nothing to defend us but our wits. Each of us has known the bonds of slavery at least once, and for many of us the only escape was the mortality of our captors.

“We survived as best we could, and over the centuries of our exile we learned to work together and hide ourselves. Our dryads mastered the warrior arts, becoming fierce protectors as well as beloved companions. We turned our grove into a hidden refuge, and took in a few kindred spirits who had magic of their own to contribute to our defense. But our safety has always been precarious, dependent on walls of misdirection woven from the dying echoes of the magic we once held.

“When Fimbulwinter fell, I feared it was the end of us.”

She bowed her head, and was silent for a long moment.

“But now, our long exile is at an end,” she went on. “For we have a new patron. Not some arrogant, uncaring god who will ignore and abuse us, nor yet some feeble wizard fumbling to bind us with scraps of power no stronger than our own. No, our new lord is a man of rare wisdom, steeped in hidden lore and wielding the power of a demigod. A man who greets us as comrades instead of pleasure slaves, and shares the fruits of his mysteries with any who pledge their loyalty. A man who is already as ageless as we are, and with our aid may one day become more than a man.”

She raised her arms in a triumphant gesture. “And see what he has wrought! Our refuge now stands within the mightiest fortress in Europe, surrounded by walls that could withstand even the Thunderer’s mighty hammer. Hard men and subtle elves stand ready to defend us while we turn our magic back to its true purpose, nurturing our hidden fastness of verdant life. In this sorcerous realm the very sun and rain come and go at our command, thanks to the implements our lord has gifted us.”

She knelt, and placed one hand flat on the stage. “Then we have the final miracle. Our new lord’s limitless magic floods the land and waters of our grove, filling us all with a warm glow of protective strength. Even our old masters never offered us such power, and this time there is no hidden corruption or terrible price to be paid. We nymphs will soon be restored to the station we once held, as demigoddesses of nature’s bounty. Only this time we have the will and the wisdom to use our power for more than idle games. Our dryads are fast blossoming into huntresses of fell power, fit to contend with even the strongest of monsters. Muriel and her sisters have already turned their pool into a little faerie realm, and in a week we’ll be ready to do the same with the entire grove. Even dear Renshitrinashlit has benefited, through the bonds of sisterhood we all share with her.”

Pelagia stood, and I saw that there were tears in her eyes now. “My sisters, our time of troubles is finally over. Tonight we celebrate the birth of a new era for the Grove of Bloody Thorns. We celebrate safety and healing, the end of tears and the beginning of new joy. We celebrate the end of our lonely struggle for survival, and the companionship of strong allies who stand ready to protect us. But most of all, we celebrate the indulgent embrace of our new lord, who assures me that any nymph who seeks a personal bond with him shall be well and truly conquered before morning!”

There was a round of laughter and catcalls at that.

“Just remember to wait your turn!” Pelagia went on. “Especially all you performers. No trying to sneak in a quickie before your show. Now, let’s demonstrate for our new lord what the Thorns can do!”

A band started up, laying down a smoky beat with drums and some kind of wind instrument. A tall nymph with long black hair swayed onto the stage as Pelagia stepped down, dancing sinuously to the beat. Three dryads followed her up, and worked their way into a circle around her. Then the nymph opened her mouth, and began to sing with the most beautiful voice I’d ever heard.

I leaned back into Xenia’s breasts, and let the dryad with the goblet feed me another sip of wine. This promised to be an interesting evening.

Chapter 4

I woke the next morning in a pile of naked nymphs. I was on my back, with Pelagia nestled in against my right side and Xenia on my left. A slender dryad whose name I didn’t even know was wrapped around one leg with her head resting on my belly, and another nymph was draped over my remaining leg. All of them had relaxed their control over their allure, but at some point during the previous evening their magical lust auras had softened into a haze of purring contentment.

It was really tempting to just go back to sleep for a few hours. I could spare the time, couldn’t I? Sleep in, then let the dryads serve a late breakfast in bed and fool around some more. Maybe head down to the pool for a bath, and go another round with the naiads. I could try out Xenia’s massage skills myself, or maybe let Pelagia show off her bondage dungeon. She’d been dropping hints about that while we watched the dryads put on their wrestling exhibition, all naked and oiled up in the ancient Greek tradition.

But I had a sudden craving for Avilla’s cooking, and I knew better than to think that was an accident. The real world was calling. Reluctantly, I worked my way out of the pile of bodies.

Pelagia’s eyes opened, and she blinked up at me sleepily. “Leaving so soon?”

“Duty calls,” I said.

She sighed, and gave me a longing look. I pulled her into a kiss, exploring her mouth with unhurried thoroughness. Apparently nymphs don’t get morning breath, and neither do I thanks to my magic.

“I’ll be back,” I promised her. My hand glided over her smooth skin, and gave her breast a friendly squeeze. “There’s no way I’m going to let this be a one-time thing.”

She smiled. “I’m glad to hear it. I won’t keep you from your labors, then. Keep us safe, Daniel.”

I climbed over her to get out of bed, and she ended up face down in the spot where I’d slept. A moment later she was asleep again.

That did leave me with a puzzle, since the room I found myself in didn’t seem to have any exits. It was a round space made entirely of living wood, with a huge bed that sprouted  from one of the walls. There were pillows strewn across the floor, and several more sleeping dryads curled up among them. But no doors, or even windows.

I vaguely remembered being pulled into a tree at some point during the evening. I hadn’t been paying much attention at the time, what with the naked nymphs being all over me. But I was pretty sure this must be a dryad’s bower.

I studied the magic in the walls for a moment, and then made a slow turn of the room to inspect its sleeping inhabitants. Three more dryads lay in a tangle among the pillows on the floor, along with a hamadryad and yet another nymph. Ah, and there was the connection I was looking for.

There wasn’t much room to move around, so I had to lift off and float over to the dryad on the bed. I bent and kissed her cheek.

“Mwah?” She murmured.

I ran my hand through her dark hair. “Hey, sleepyhead. Time to let me out.”

“Don’ wanna,” she protested. She curled one arm around my waist, and tried to pull me down onto the bed.

I swatted her firm little butt. She squeaked, and shot upright. “Eep!”

A chorus of murmured protests made her cringe, and cover her mouth. She looked around for a moment, seeming confused about where she was. Then she blinked, and a huge smile split her face.

I took her hand, and levitated her into the air with me so I could whisper in her ear. “Awake now?”

She wrapped arms and legs around me in a full-body hug, and whispered back. “Yes, Master. Fuck, I’m the happiest dryad ever right now. I got to host you and Mistress Pelagia’s first time together?”

She was so cute I couldn’t help but hug her back. “Yep. You’re adorable when you get worked up. But I have to leave now.”

She pouted, and rubbed herself against me. “Do you really have to, Master? Wouldn’t you like to stay, and fuck me again? You can do all that boring human stuff later, can’t you?”

“There are things I have to get done to keep you all safe,” I told her, taking my cue from Pelagia. “The monsters won’t wait for a convenient time. But I’ll be back.”

“Promise?” She said. “I really want you to fuck my ass like you did Nomiki. She looked like she was going to go mad from ecstasy.”

I love my life.

“Remind me the next time I’m here for a visit, and I’ll show you exactly what she was feeling. Um, what was your name again? I think I was a little too distracted to catch it last night.”

She dimpled prettily. “I’m Timo, Master. I don’t think I had a chance to tell you last night, but thank you for asking. Um, if you’ll put me down I’ll show you the way out.”

She leaned against me for a moment when I put her down, just taking in my scent. Then she took my hand, and pulled me into the wall. A moment later we were stepping out onto soft grass.

“Thank you, Timo. I suppose I’ll have to learn how to do that myself one of these days, but it looks like it’s going to take practice.”

The lights were still out, but I could just make out her face in the dim glow of faerie magic. She grinned. “You want to practice going in and out of me, over and over? I’ll be happy to help you with that, Master.”

I swatted her butt again. “Wench. I wonder where my clothes ended up?”

It took a bit of searching, but we managed to find most of them. I got some knowing looks from the guards as I made my way back to the palace with only one shoe and half the buttons missing from my jacket, though.

I finally made it to the breakfast room, and found Elin and Tina already there. Elin looked up from her cinnamon roll, and burst out laughing.

“Goodness, Daniel. You look like you were attacked by a pack of wild animals. It appears that you’ve finally met your match.”

Avilla leaned over the breakfast bar to look at me, and wrinkled her nose. “Someone needs a bath. Go on, you’ve just enough time before your food is ready.”

“Yeah, yeah, I’m going. Thanks for the wakeup call, though.”

“Oh, it was purely selfish. I was afraid we might lose you forever without a reminder.”

“I said I’d go find you if you didn’t come back,” Tina put in.

Elin rolled her eyes. “As if you’d make it past the first nymph you met. We’d find you passed out in a heap of nature spirits sometime after Yule.”

“I know!” Tina said happily.

Elin facepalmed.

I took a quick shower, and ran into Cerise on the way back to my room to dress. She offered me a high five, and a knowing grin.

“What did I tell you, big guy? Dryads are awesome, aren’t they?”

“I can’t argue with that. But I think I’m going to limit myself to one nymph at a time from now on. Things got a little hazy after Pelagia and Xenia decided to double-team me.”

“Lucky dog. So what was the naga like? I’ve never done a snake woman before.”

“Seduce her and find out,” I said. “A gentleman doesn’t tell.”

“Gentleman? What the heck is a gentleman?”

Eventually I managed to get some food in me, and retreat to my workshop to get a little work done. A nap was sounding pretty good by then, but I didn’t trust this temporary peace we were enjoying. Another army could show up on our doorstep at any time, and the next bunch might be worse than the andregi.

Well, armies I knew how to handle. One thing I’d noticed in our last few battles was that we didn’t have nearly enough mortars to properly cover the approaches to Kozalin. But that was easily fixed.

I spent most of the day improving the island’s defenses. Thankfully the two mortar bunkers I’d set up at opposite ends of the island had plenty of room, so I was able to expand each battery from two tubes to four. While I was at it I put in a bin for ready ammo storage near each mortar, and installed an ammo hoist from the magazine below so the men wouldn’t have to exhaust themselves running up and down the stairs.

The defenses around each bunker also needed some work. I moved the nearby quad-mount air defense machine guns to small bartizans atop the corners of the bunker, each one surrounded by a stone parapet to protect the gunners. I also installed a couple more machine guns on the outward-facing side of the bunker, where they could cover the lower fighting deck of the wall that the whole structure was built on.

But most of that had to be open to the air, and given the increasingly arctic conditions trying to stand long watches out there would be pretty brutal. So I put in a fully enclosed ready room next to the mortars, with a ladder leading up to a watch post protected by a dome of transparent quartz. That way the men could keep someone on sentry duty no matter how bad the weather got, and the weapon crews could all stay warm as long as they weren’t actually fighting.

The men seemed pretty enthusiastic about the improvements. Partway through the first bunker Demetrios showed up to have a look at what I was doing, and nodded approvingly.

“This will be very useful, milord. I don’t suppose you could put a barracks up here while you’re at it? It would be easier to keep the mortars manned if we could quarter the crews nearby.”

“Sure, we can do that. I don’t want to build anything else on top of the wall, but I can open up some more rooms under the bunker. How many men are you planning to keep here?”

I ended up putting in a barracks and mess area big enough for a platoon, buried deep inside the wall. Connected to that was a large storeroom, an armory, some private rooms for sergeants and officers, and a couple of extra rooms for future expansion.

Once we had the alterations worked out I did the same thing to the other mortar bunker, and then set up two more of them so the island would have one at each cardinal point. Sixteen mortars ought to be enough to hold off anything, as long as they didn’t run out of ammo.

We already had a pair of factory enchantments running twenty-four hours a day to make mortar bombs, and I thought we were building up ammo stocks at an acceptable pace. But I went ahead and built a new one to make training rounds. Instead of exploding on impact, those would just emit a bright colored light for a few minutes. Drawing on yesterday’s amulet experiments I even managed to set it up so there were six colors to choose from, and the mortar rounds were marked with a ring of the same color as the light they’d make.

It was a lot of work, but it left me feeling better about the prospect of leaving the city if another mission came up. If there was some enemy working on a clever plan to take out the mortars they’d need time to account for the changes, and the bunkers would be much tougher targets than before. Give the new crews a week to practice, and assaulting Kozalin with a conventional army would become more or less impossible.

Too bad conventional armies weren’t our only problem, as Elin pointed out over lunch.

“Not that I object to your making Black Island even more impregnable, but it’s already the strongest fortress in Europe,” she said. “As often as you throw yourself into the thick of battle, shouldn’t you be more concerned about your own equipment? You need much better armor, and didn’t you have some idea for a new weapon?”

“I’m trying to arrange things so I don’t have to keep doing that,” I explained. “No matter how good you are, if you keep putting yourself in harm’s way the odds will eventually catch up with you. Besides, I can only be in one place at a time. So I’m trying to set things up so our troops can handle as many problems as possible without my help.”

“I suppose you’ll be less a target for assassins if you’re not so obviously the lynchpin of our entire faction,” she conceded. “But I still don’t like it.”

“You know, Elin, if you’re that worried you could always start going out with us,” Cerise said. “You’re pretty handy in a fight, and having two healers would be awesome.”

“No, thank you,” Elin protested emphatically. “Every time I leave the island to help I end up almost dying, and I’ve had quite enough of that for one lifetime. I intend to wait out the remainder of Ragnarok behind the safety of our walls.”

Cerise frowned. “It’s not that bad, is it? I mean, sure, there was the thing with the dwarves, but that took us all by surprise. You did fine in the big night battle with the andregi.”

“You mean the one where my medical station almost got overrun by savages who rape every woman they get their hands on?” Elin said severely. “It’s only luck that Daniel received warning of their intentions in time. And don’t forget my first battle, with Hel’s legion. I still have nightmares about those giant bone golems rising out of the water between me and safety.”

Cerise hung her head. “I’m sorry, Elin. I guess we’ve kind of been letting you down.”

“Not at all,” Elin declared. “I volunteered for each of those missions, and you did everything you could to protect me. For that matter, I suppose I’m not entirely an easy target for our enemies. But I don’t have the temperament for such heroics, Cerise. You may crave danger and excitement, but I’d very much prefer to do my healing from a safe location.”

“That’s fine,” I said. “Just because you’re capable of protecting yourself doesn’t mean you should be forced to take chances. How is the healing going?”

She smiled in relief. “Quite well, actually. Did you know some architect from Kozalin has started a construction business down on the street level? They specialize in finishing out your buildings with interior walls, doors, window shutters and so forth. It’s really quite amazing how quickly they can work, especially with the building supplies those machines of yours make. I’ve managed to turn my little storefront into a proper clinic.”

“That sound useful. Are you getting a lot of customers?”

“Oh, yes. I’m only open for a few hours in the mornings, but I had to start charging or I’d be overrun with refugees. I’ve hired a couple of assistants to help manage things, and I’m thinking of taking on an apothecary.”

“Sometimes I help,” Tina put it. “Yesterday we had a patient who was having a really bad delivery, but I blessed her and everything got better!”

“She’s a walking fertility blessing,” Elin explained. “If all of Bast’s priestesses had that sort of power, I can see why her church was so prominent in ancient Egypt.”

“Well done, Tina. I’m glad you can help out. Elin, what do you think about expanding your clinic into our main treatment center for injured soldiers? I’m planning to make more vehicles for the troops sometime in the next week or two, and I’m sure I can come up with something for transporting wounded. That way the next time there’s a battle you can work here, instead of venturing out into the city where things could get dangerous.”

“I’d been hoping you might agree to a plan of that nature,” Elin agreed. “I already have a triage station, and a room where we can set up cots for the wounded. Only, it would be best to have some recovery rooms for the more serious cases. There’s no one in the space next to mine, so perhaps I could take it over?”

“That will work. Just check with Tavrin first, in case he had plans for it. At the rate we’re expanding I’m going to have to put up another building soon to make room.”

“Yes, the street level is becoming quite lively. We have an inn now, along with two tailors and a carpentry shop, and a tea house just opened next to the produce market. At this rate the entire street will be full in another week.”

“Sounds like I need to do some more expansion soon,” I mused. But my thoughts were interrupted by the sudden arrival of one of Sefwin’s agents.

“Milord!” She called. “There’s trouble at the docks. The refugees are rioting, and trying to board the merchant ships!”

Ah, shit.

“I’m coming,” I said. “Get a message to Captain Rain to muster his company, and move to secure the docks. Cerise?”

“Right with you, Daniel.”

As we raced through the halls of the vast fortress I’d built, I contemplated that I really, really needed to do something about our communication problems. It would probably take half an hour to get all my officers in the same room, and that’s an eternity in a crisis. Not to mention that we’d be relying on messengers to find out what was happening outside, which meant long delays in responding to any change in a situation.

So instead of heading for a command post like any sane ruler, I led Cerise to the roof. If I wanted to see what was happening and deal with it properly I’d have to do exactly what I’d just told Elin I was trying to avoid, and go there in person.

“What’s the plan?” Cerise asked as we emerged into the cold. It was a clear day, so at least we had decent visibility.

“Fly over and see what we’re dealing with first,” I answered. “I’d rather not kill civilians if we can avoid it, but we need to protect those ships.”

  I took to the air, and swooped across the harbor looking for the disturbance. Cerise sprouted wings, and followed me.

There. A ragged mob surged around a couple of piers where ships were docked, screaming and struggling with the sailors. Some of them had torches, and they weren’t just for show. A wooden shack overlooking the piers was on fire, and so was one mast of the merchant ship closest to shore.

I hovered over the scene for a few moments, taking in details. The crowd was at least a thousand strong, maybe more. Almost all of them were young men, dressed in worn and ragged clothing like most of the refugees. Most of them carried clubs, though, and they didn’t hesitate to use them.

“They came here looking for trouble,” Cerise observed.

“I was noticing the same thing,” I replied. Improvised weapons had become common in Kozalin, but there was no reason they’d be carrying lit torches around in the day unless they planned on burning something.

There were too many of them for my troops to disperse, unless I wanted them to open fire on the crowd. Not to mention that at the rate they were going they’d burn at least a couple of the ships before Rain’s men could get here. But maybe I could put the local fear of magic to good use.

I dropped onto the deck of the burning ship, and quenched the flames with an angry gesture. Some idiot took a swing at me, and his club broke against my shield. I shoved him away with a burst of force magic, sending him careening over the ship’s railing and into the water. Then I drew Grinder, and turned it on.

My weapon’s keening howl immediately drew every eye, and the rioters closest to me shied away nervously. But just waving the plasma blade around wasn’t enough to discourage them. Kozalin is a much rougher place than my world, and its inhabitants aren’t as easy to intimidate as the civilized people I grew up with. Not ten feet away from me a knot of rioters was methodically beating a sailor to death with their cudgels, and only one of them even glanced in my direction.

I stalked over, and cut him in half with Grinder.

Fragments of broken bone and charred flesh sprayed out across the deck of the ship. I could barely hear my victim’s scream over Grinder’s howl, but I couldn’t stop there. I swung again, taking a man’s arm off, and then the group in front of me was finally trying to run.

I turned to look for another target, and found an unnatural shroud of darkness spreading across half the ship. Terrified rioters stumbled out of it, some of them bleeding from knife wounds. But they couldn’t get away, because the crowd still advancing on the wharf was packed too tight to let them through.

Damn it, I didn’t want to kill them all. Most of them were probably just hotheads, whipped into a frenzy by some rabble rouser. But what could I do that would be showy enough to terrify the whole crowd, without immediately killing most of them?

None of my weapons would work for this. But I wasn’t in any real danger here, so I could afford the time it would take to weave a spell manually. I took off again, reaching out to spin a web of force magic over the dock. When I’d first come to this world I’d had serious range problems with my magic. But thanks to Cerise I knew how the local wizards and witches got around those issues, and now I put that knowledge to good use. My spell grew quickly, spilling out along the dock in both directions. As long as the spell’s heart was within my grasp, I could extend its reach until the cost outgrew my mana supply.

Covering the entire dock barely put a dent in my amulet’s output. Then I took hold of the spell, and rose higher. Hundreds of startled rioters were suddenly jerked off the ground, and dragging into the air kicking and screaming. I flew down the length of the dock, pulling them all along in the air behind me, and then started dropping them onto the heads of the crowd in the streets.

Sure enough, that got their attention. The crowd pulled back from the outlandish spectacle. I pushed forward, scooping up dozens of fresh human projectiles and raining them down on the heads of their comrades. I was dropping them from a couple of stories up, and while the field of force magic slowed their fall it probably looked like they were all going to die.

The crowd broke, and fled screaming into the city.

For a few minutes I worried that I’d gotten carried away. But as the streets cleared I was relieved to see that there were only a few bodies here and there. Most of the people I’d dropped had landed lightly enough to pick themselves up and hobble away, which was what I’d been aiming for.

I cast about for someone in charge, and spotted Harbormaster Lund surrounded by a knot of armed men by one of the warehouses. I stalked over to him, and Cerise joined me along the way.

“What happened?” I asked.

“The damned thieves were after our grain,” one of the other men spat. “I can see I’ll need more guards, if I’m to risk this voyage again.”

“The dukes have cut rations for the refugees again,” Lund said. “What they’re handing out now is just slow starvation, and the common folk can hardly afford to buy more when wheat is going for twelve pennies a bushel.”

“Twelve pennies!” Cerise exclaimed. “That’s highway robbery! Even in a city, it shouldn’t be more than four.”

“Hah! That shows what you know, missy,” the ship captain scoffed. “You think I can hire a crew to brave icy gales and sea serpents for a measly price like that? I had to pay triple wages for this run, and with the casualties we’ve seen the next one will be worse.”

“Well, but, twelve pennies!” Cerise protested.

I stepped up behind her, and rested a hand on her shoulder. “It always happens, in this kind of situation. Everyone wants food and there isn’t enough to go around, so that drives the price up. If we let it float the chance for wealth will draw in merchants from anywhere that has a surplus, and we’ll have a lot more food to go around. But we’ll have food riots and starving refugees while we wait for things to improve. On the other hand, if we fix the price at something that sounds reasonable no ships will come here, so the city will eventually run out of food and everyone will starve.”

Cerise pouted at me. “I guess I can see that. But there has to be something we can do.”

And she was the one who’d wanted to let the city fend for itself. But then, I’d suspected she wouldn’t stick to that resolution if it was tested. Cerise liked to act tough, but she still had a conscience.

“I don’t know as there’s much we can do,” Lund said. “Besides guarding the docks better, if we can find the manpower for it.”

“Aye, that would be welcome,” the ship captain said. “There’s a fair few men looking for markets in this disaster, but most aren’t eager to risk docking at a major city. Too much chance of some noble confiscating our cargoes, and drafting the men for his militia. It’s safer to dock at the smaller towns, where you can sell your cargo to the garrison and take on a load of rich men looking to flee south.”

“I suppose that makes sense,” I said. “Where are you shipping from, anyway?”

“Mauritania had a good harvest this year, and Egypt was even better. The way things are going, we’ll run out of ships and sailors before we run short of grain to sell. I lost three men to the cold this run, and I keep hearing rumors about sea serpents.”

I shook my head. “If Jormungandr’s brood were really trying to blockade us you wouldn’t have made it here. I think they’re just congregating for the attack on Asgard, or whatever Loki is planning for his next move. Alright, here’s what we’re going to do. Lund, I’m going to spend the afternoon making some improvements here. I’ll throw up fortifications to guard three or four of the piers, so you’ve got a secure place to unload ships. My men will stand guard at first, but we’ll need to put together a militia to take over that duty. While I’m at it I can partially enclose the piers with self-warming stone, and the fort will include some living space for whoever you think is most critical to keeping the harbor running.”

The section of harbor we were standing in had a street with a few small buildings along it right at the shoreline, and then a steep slope rising fifteen feet or so to the level of the rest of the district. Considering how many of the buildings in the area were either collapsed or abandoned, it shouldn’t be hard to find room for a couple of small keeps at opposite ends of the area. Then I could just put gatehouses at the top of the ramps leading down to the docks, and a few sections of wall here and there to control access.

“That will take care of our dockworkers, but it sounds like the sailors need a hand if we’re going to keep the grain flowing. So I’m also going to set up a shop here to sell warmth enchantments. The version I’m selling won’t make you completely immune to the cold, but it makes a thin shirt give as much warmth as a heavy coat. We’ll put an enchantment on any item of clothing for, oh, thirty pennies or so, and we’ll take payment in grain as well as cash.”

We didn’t have enough spare clothing in the city to be selling it, but I figured I could make an enchantment factory to put warmth spells on existing items of clothing. It would run slower, but five minutes per item was still almost three hundred warmth enchantments per day. We’d just have to hire a crew of attendants to run the thing in shifts.

“What about the grain prices?” Cerise asked.

“Well, like I said, trying to dictate a price just makes things worse. But that doesn’t mean we can’t do anything. We just need to find ways to get more money circulating in the general populace. The dockworkers could probably use a raise, and we clearly need a bigger militia…”

Chapter 5

A small crowd had gathered to watch me work, despite the bitter cold. It was another gloomy winter day, and the feeble light of the sun struggled to break through the heavy overcast. But my harbor renovations had caused quite a stir, even before I’d announced my plans for further improvements to the district. The little council of guildmasters and refugee leaders that Lund was assembling had been eager to accept my proposals, and of course they’d told their followers all about it. No doubt the rumor mill had gone wild in the last couple of days.

There were gasps and murmurs from the crowd when I waved my hand, and the broken rubble that covered the lot vanished. The wooden debris that was left behind rose into the air, and floated over to form a pile on the street.

“Where’s the property line, exactly?”

Jakob, the weathered old man who seemed to be the leader of the Fishermen’s Alliance, stepped up beside me and pointed.

“Right up to the edge of the street, milord. It starts on the riverbank at that boat ramp, and runs along Fishmonger’s Way up to Footpad Alley. That rubble along the Alley used to be some rich merchant’s warehouse, but we haven’t seen hide nor hair of his men in weeks.”

“That would be Harold & Sons, according to the property records,” the Harbormaster put in. “But their office is empty, and I have no idea how to contact them. Assuming their management is even alive.”

“Alright, then I’m condemning it,” I said. “That way I can use the whole block. If an heir turns up I suppose I’ll pay him something for the land, but it isn’t doing anyone any good as it is. What about the boats?”

There were several boat ramps along this stretch of the riverbank, and dozens of small fishing boats pulled up onto land. Most of them had been propped up with wooden beams, and covered with tarps to form improvised shelters. There were little fires burning everywhere along the shore, but even so I was amazed that anyone could survive under those conditions.

The old man spat. “Fishing’s impossible now. A few of the boys have tried it, but no one comes back. If the cold doesn’t get them, the goblins do.”

“I was afraid of that. Well, I’ll give you a place to store them for now. I’ve got some projects going that might change things, but I can’t make any promises yet.”

The warmth cloak factory was running now, but I’d need to do something about vehicle production before I could do anything to protect shipping. Eventually I’d like to get armored vehicles patrolling the river, and chasing off any trolls or goblins that were still lurking about. That would take at least a week or two to set up, though, and who could say if I’d be able to spare the manpower then? It was all too likely that some new problem would come up first.

But that was a problem for another day.

I laid out foot-high walls to illustrate the plan I had in mind as I worked out the details. The city engineer that Lund had dug up was able to point out the nearest sewer line, which helped. There was no source of fresh water, but I could take care of that myself. I’d have to knock down the few huts that were still standing, the last remnant of what had been a crowded shanty town before an earthquake leveled half the city. But that just meant I had to do things in the right order.

What I ended up with was sort of a mutant cross between a modern office building and a medieval keep. I used the same construction technique as I had on my island, with a framework of heavy nickel-iron beams supporting sheets of the same material that formed the floor of each level. The walls were all stone, and I laid down a thin layer of stone over the metal floors as well. The whole thing was a bit over sixty feet tall, with six floors of interior space.

The outside wall was fifteen feet thick, with a gatehouse protecting the main entrance onto Fishmonger’s Way. That got two metal gates and a portcullis, with murder holes in the ceiling of the entrance area and plenty of arrow slits on the floors above. A second gate opened onto the riverbank where the boats were drawn up, but that one was just a portcullis and a single nickel-iron gate.

I didn’t bother with the towers and battlements of a proper castle, though. It would take hours to shape all that complicated stonework myself, and this wasn’t intended to be a real fortress. So I made do with a chest-high parapet around the edge of the roof, and enclosed watch posts at the corners so sentries could stay out of the weather. That would be enough to let a small militia armed with rifles hold off any monsters or hostile troops that got into the city.

Behind the rear entrance I set up a large, high-ceilinged storage area where fishing boats could be kept, or even built if a local shipwright wanted to move his operation. The rest of the interior was dominated by a large, rectangular atrium in the middle. I installed lights in the ceiling, and stairs that worked their way up the balconies around it. The surrounding space was subdivided into twelve different areas on each level, each with a doorway and several windows opening out onto a balcony. Each room was still a good bit bigger than the average house, but I figured I’d let the residents work out the details of any further subdivisions.

Of course, I couldn’t just build the whole thing at once. Instead, I started by throwing up the side facing Fishmonger’s Way. The whole structure was self-warming, so that gave the crowd that was sheltering in the boats and the huts around them someplace to move to. Most of them were pretty eager to relocate once they realized it was warm inside, and the older men organized work parties to move their meager possessions.

While they worked on that I put in a row of shops along the street, with thick quartz windows and sturdy doors of nickel-iron that would keep out monsters in the event of an attack. Each shop got a back room, a basement and a second-floor living area as well, which made them pretty roomy by local standards. A water tank on the roof provided running water for proper kitchens and bathrooms, and a hallway running behind the shops would let their inhabitants visit each other without venturing outdoors.

Installing all of that took long enough for the huts to be mostly cleared out, and then I was able to move on with building the rest of the main keep. I took the time to give it running water as well, connecting to several bathrooms and kitchen areas on each floor. One look at the filthy state of the shelter’s inhabitants convinced me to follow up with a bathhouse on the ground floor.

A haggard-looking woman poked her head in the room as I was finishing up the soaking pools, and gasped.

“A bathhouse? Oh, bless you, lord wizard! We haven’t had a bathhouse in West End since I was a girl.”

Her voice seemed familiar. I took a closer look at her face, and realized it was the widow of the harbor pilot who’d died on my expedition to clear out the river ice. The last time I’d seen her was at his funeral.

“Well, each of the new keeps is going to have one,” I said, still trying to remember the woman’s name. “I’m even putting in an enchantment to heat the water, so you don’t have to haul in a mountain of wood every morning. I take it you’ve been holed up with the fishermen?”

“Yes, milord. The house wasn’t safe after the Battle of the Docks, not with the door bashed in and rattlers lurking in the night. The fishermen don’t look like much, but they’ve a lot of strong arms with stout cudgels at hand.”

I frowned. “Rattlers?”

“Aye, milord. Them walking bones, what’s hiding in the crypts.”

Right. Six weeks ago an army of undead had attacked the docks, and some of them were still hiding out in back alleys and the crypts under the city. There were ghouls, too, and possibly worse things. Street people who wandered around alone had an uncomfortable tendency to disappear, and there were reports of houses being broken into at night.

Hopefully the work I was doing would improve the situation, but it would take time.

“They won’t be breaking in here,” I assured her. “I’m surprised the fishermen took you in, though. They seem pretty clannish.”

“I have kinfolk with them, lucky enough.” She took a hesitant step into the room, looking around. A young boy followed her in, sticking close behind her and staring at everything with wide eyes.

“So this’ll be the cold rinse, and then there’s a heated pool? Oh, there’s two sides! Men and women, then, milord? That will be nice. We only had the one pool at the Blue Mermaid, so we had to switch things on a schedule.”

“Sounds like you know a bit about bathhouses,” I commented.

“My uncle owned the Blue Mermaid,” she explained. “I used to work there when I was a girl, before he passed away and the tax men took everything.”

“Great. It’s yours, then. I’ll talk to the elders in the Fisherman’s Alliance, and get things set up. I’m sure they’ll be happy to have a relative who knows something about the business running this place.”

She gave me an astonished look. “What? Oh, my! All this, my lord? But, I don’t have any money to speak of.”

“You can pay your rent in services,” I said. “Let fishermen bathe for free, or something like that. I’ll put in a couple of extra walls to give you a dorm room for staff next door, and a living area for your family. You can work things out from there.”

“Bless you, my lord. Yes, yes I can. Thank you, lord wizard.”

As far as I was concerned, setting her up with a way to support herself was the least I could do. I still felt guilty about getting her husband killed.

Jakob didn’t seem to mind the arrangement. If anything, he was glad to pass off the details of managing the keep’s bathhouse.

“You should be able to rent out the shops along the street, too,” I pointed out. “I imagine there are plenty of shopkeepers who’d love to have a safer place to live. So that will give you a bit of income to work with.”

“Aye, milord. I expect we can rent out half the keep as well. There’s room for a few hundred more folk here, easy.”

“Good. Have you got your militia picked out?”

Giving away a giant stone keep would have set a bad precedent, so I was charging them ‘rent’ in a traditional medieval form. The Fisherman’s Alliance would be responsible for maintaining a standing militia of forty men who could be deployed to help defend the district, and another sixty who would be ready to protect the keep itself in an emergency. The keep’s position at the western end of the district would also help disrupt any attack that got through the city walls from that direction, and provide a secure base for watch patrols in the area.

“That and more, milord. Everyone wants a crack at them magic weapons.”

“Glad to hear it. Captain Rain thinks he can work you into the training plan in a couple of days, so you should hear from him soon.”

Swords and spears aren’t much use against a lot of monsters, so I’d decided to outfit the militia forces with rifles and flamers just like my own troops. I had plenty of both, thanks to the factory enchantments I’d built. But of course no one in Kozalin knew how to use such weapons, so we’d have to bring them in for training first.

Captain Rain had wanted to give them at least a six week course, but that would have been impossible. There were going to be at least six of these militia groups, plus the city watch, and we were still training my own forces as well. So instead I’d prevailed on him to set up a three-day course in weapon use and basic tactics. Just enough that they wouldn’t be shooting themselves in the foot, or setting each other on fire by accident. Anything beyond that, they’d have to figure out for themselves.

Honestly, I expected that they’d do fine at the duties I wanted them for. Sweeping the streets for stray monsters and defending a fixed position were both simple jobs, and there were a lot of military veterans in the local population. Stray zombies and the occasional goblin raiding band shouldn’t be a big threat to them.

The plan also gave me a chance to inject a little money into the local economy. In addition to the rifles, flamers and warmth cloaks I planned to issue, the militia members would each get paid sixty silver pennies as a signing bonus. The forty who were on active duty would get another fourteen pennies a week, which was an impressive wage by local standards, and the reservists would get six. If they played their cards right, the Fishermen’s Alliance could have a prosperous little community here.

“We’ll be ready, milord,” Jakob assured me.

I took my leave, and decided to walk home today instead of flying. I had a lot of ideas about how to revitalize the Docks District, but sometimes you need to see a problem with your own eyes to really understand it. It had been weeks since I took the time to personally take in the state of the district, and things had gotten a lot worse since then.

About half the buildings I passed were in ruins, either burned during the battle of the docks or collapsed by the earthquake. Deep snow drifts covered the rubble, and choked most of the alleys and smaller streets. There were whole blocks that seemed deserted, except for the smoke rising from a handful of chimneys.

How many bodies were buried in the snow?

Thousands, probably. It was an issue Filip had already raised, and one I didn’t have a solution for. Working outdoors was dangerous in this cold, and after the earthquake what remained of the city government had given up on even trying. Here and there the streets were blocked by rubble, or huge drifts of snow. Pockets of survivors were mostly cut off from the rest of the city, scavenging the ruins for firewood and melting snow for drinking water.

Maybe I should make another warmth enchantment factory, so we could equip work parties? The refugee shelters that I’d set up had all weathered the disasters just fine, and they were full of half-starved peasants who’d be happy for work. If I could find someone to organize the effort, I could hire a few hundred of them to at least clear the streets. Although I wasn’t sure where I’d get enough tools for a project like that.

I turned a corner, and passed through a newly-built gate onto a larger street that ran along the bank of the river. Here, there was still activity. There were shops and offices that were open, and men hurrying about on business. Several merchant ships were in port, and work parties labored to unload them.

I stopped to observe the work for a few minutes. Completely enclosing the docks had proved impractical, but I’d given a couple of the most active piers a roof and some sections of wall in places where they wouldn’t be in the way. The self-warming structure gave decent protection against the wind, and moderated the cold a good bit.

It was still brutal work, but the laborers would be getting warmth enchantments on their coats over the next couple of days. Between the improvements and the higher wages I’d arranged the job should at least be survivable at that point.

I reluctantly concluded that that was the best I could do for now, and moved on down the street.

There were some inns and taverns open here, and what looked like a whorehouse. The offices of several merchant companies, and some shops selling rope and canvas. A couple of the larger roads leading deeper into the city were still clear, and there was a steady flow of wagons and carts moving around. The horses were all wrapped in blankets, but they still looked pretty miserable.

Could I warm the streets somehow? That would take a lot of heaters. With all the storms we’d been getting some kind of overhead protection would be good, too. I could probably tinker up some kind of warmth field, but trying to protect every road in the city would be impossible.

Well, I was only planning to build six of those keeps. Maybe I could start by connecting them to each other, the refugee shelters and the rest of the docks? That would allow travel between all the important points in the district, as well as the shops and businesses along the roads between them. It would probably take a few days, but it might be worth the time. Not only would it help revive the local economy, it would also mean a lot of people weren’t trapped indoors forever.

It was kind of odd, how there weren’t any women on the streets. But that was how things worked in Varmland. The dangerous jobs were automatically considered men’s work, and just going outside was dangerous right now. So people stayed home as much as they could, and if an errand needed to be run it was a man who did it.

Almost everyone I saw was armed, but most just carried a knife or a wooden club. Spears were too clumsy for the city streets, and swords were too expensive for most people. For that matter, there were probably laws about who could own ‘real’ weapons. I was tempted to make a sword factory and hand them out for free, just because of that. But no, it wouldn’t actually do much to make people safer. A club is more than enough to handle a goblin or two, but no ordinary weapon would help a citizen who came face to face with something like a zombie or ghoul. Let alone trolls, ungols or winter wraiths.

Things would get bad pretty quickly if we had ungols or winter wraiths sneak into the city. A monster like that could hide in the ruined buildings, and raid the surrounding homes at night with impunity. Everything I built was designed to keep them out, but a normal house might as well be a big lunch box. One more reason to do something about getting the rubble cleared, and get regular street patrols running.

I got a surprise when I finally reached the causeway leading out to my island. The gates that guarded the causeway were open, and a small crowd was gathered there. Someone had set up the big space heaters I’d built a couple of months ago, when I was leading my little band of refugees south to Kozalin. The square outside the gates was still cold, but it was nothing like the arctic chill that shrouded the rest of the city.

I worked my way through the crowd, and past the squad of soldiers who were guarding the gate. Once I reached the causeway I found the reason for the crowd. When I’d rebuilt it after the last attack I’d expanded it to about twelve feet wide, with walls and a roof to protect travelers from the weather. There were enough windows that the interior wasn’t exactly comfortable, but the self-warming stone kept things well above freezing.

Apparently a lot of local entrepreneurs had seen that as an opportunity, because there was a row of little market stalls running down one side of the hallway now. Crowds of customers inspected their wares, which seemed to consist of everything from fresh fish to simple jewelry.

“I should have expected something like this,” I mused to myself. “The regular markets are all closed, but most of the people who ran them are still alive and looking for a way to stay in business. Tavrin must be renting out stall spaces.”

The amount of money involved would be trivial, which was probably why I hadn’t heard about it. But I wasn’t crazy about the idea of clogging up the island’s only entrance with an improvised market like this. If there was an emergency it would probably add thirty minutes to our response time. It wasn’t as safe for the civilians as it looked, either, since the whole causeway structure was mined with magical explosives.

Maybe I should build another keep in front of the gatehouse, and set it up as a market?

I stopped at a stall that sold little glass trinkets, and the boy running the counter grinned up at me. “Baubles for your lady, milord?”

The old man sitting beside him was making a little blown-glass bird, but of course his technique was completely different from what I was used to. They didn’t have blowtorches in Kozalin, after all.

“You two make all your own wares?” I asked.

The boy shook his head. “That’s just gramps, milord. I never had the touch for it. But his hearing’s a’goin, so I talk to the customers now. Wait, are you the wizard, milord?”

“Yes.”

“Honored to meet you, lord wizard. In that case, the first one’s free. I hear you’ve a lot of ladies to please.”

The little scamp grinned up at me, and I had to smile. He knew how to sell his wares. If I came home with just one cute trinket I’d end up with at least two unhappy women pouting at me. Maybe three - Cerise may be a bloodthirsty maniac in battle, but she could be surprisingly girly at home.

I ended up buying one for each of my girls. I considered adding Pelagia and her grove to my shopping list too, but I wasn’t sure if ancient nymphs and dryads had the same taste for that sort of thing. The maids would, of course, but buying them presents would send the wrong sort of message.

That got me thinking about the other women in my life. How had I ended up with so many of them, anyway? Most of them gorgeous, and clearly willing if I ever wanted to make the time for them. Was that just the fruits of success? Or had Hecate arranged this situation on purpose for some reason?

Knowing her, that was all too likely. If I asked her about it she’d probably make some comment about rewarding her champion for his work, and then chide me for not taking more advantage of my opportunities. As if I had time to keep up with any more women.

There was one woman I might just need to make time for, though.

Instead of heading upstairs to the palace, I went into the produce market my farmers had set up. A door in the back led into a large storeroom, with a heavy metal gate guarded by a couple of my soldiers in the back. From there it was a short walk to Corinna’s grove.

Most of the trees here were huge oaks and pines, standing tall in the bright artificial sunlight. There were a few other species mixed in with them, smaller trees that I wasn’t enough of a botanist to name. A group of dryads were practicing with spears in the middle of the clearing, and for a moment I turned in their direction. But no, the faint tug I was following led elsewhere.

On the edge of the grove, carefully placed where it wouldn’t be shaded by the larger trees, was a short, gnarled trunk with an odd texture that reminded me of driftwood, and only a few leafy branches sprouting here and there.

This was Alanna’s tree? How odd. I couldn’t place the species at first, but something about the look of those twisted branches jogged a memory. I’d seen pictures of a tree like this before, but where?

I’d just remembered the answer to that question when Alanna poked her head out of the trunk.

“Greetings, my wizard,” she said. “Have you come to give me your decision?”

“I came to talk to you about it,” I said.

“Ah, so that’s how it is. Will you come inside, then? I can offer hospitality, while you grapple with your scruples.”

I took her hand, and let her pull me into the bower hidden in the heart of her tree. But what I found there was as unexpected as the tree itself. Where the other dryads I’d visited had a cozy bedroom dotted with furs and pillows, Alanna’s bower looked like a network of caves and twisty passages carved from a landscape of desiccated wood.

Bright sunlight fell from somewhere above, and a maze of little waterfalls and brooks gave the place a pleasant feel, although the air was oddly dry and warm. The room I found myself in held a low table surrounded with plush pillows, a cabinet filled with herbs, and an interesting variety of exotic rugs and tapestries. Through openings in the walls I caught glimpses of a bedroom, what might have been a study, and various other spaces that looked more like some strange wilderness than a home.

“Am I truly so surprising, my wizard?”

I realized I’d been staring, and moved to join Alanna at the table.

“Yes,” I said honestly. “Either you have more hidden depths than the average dryad, or you just don’t hide them nearly as well. Your tree is a bristlecone pine, isn’t it?”

“That name seems apt, but it isn’t one I’ve heard before. The Atlanteans called us melavis forsenat, if you speak their tongue. Would you like tea?”

“Sure. Atlantis is a bit before my time, Alanna. But that only begs more questions. A gentleman doesn’t ask a lady’s age, but you’re making me wonder here.”

She poured water into a glass pot, and gestured with both hands. The sunlight streaming down from above seemed to gather in her hands, and suffuse the water. Well, I’d been wondering how she was going to heat it without a fire.

“Most human scholars think that dryads are immortal,” she said as she prepared the tea. “But of course they are mistaken. Most trees can live for perhaps a century or two. Those that give birth to a dryad might last a millennium, but rarely longer. Those cute little apple and pear girls in Pelagia’s grove won’t last even that long.”

“So a dryad’s lifespan depends on her tree? But bristlecone pines live for thousands of years,” I said. “There’s some debate about whether they age at all, in the normal sense.”

She raised an eyebrow at that. “Have you been to the lands across the sea, Daniel? I meet few wizards who know such things.”

“I have, actually,” I said. “But that ties in with the question of where I came from, which is something Hecate doesn’t want me talking about for now.”

“I wouldn’t care to pry into Hecate’s secrets,” she said with a wry smile. “The last time I crossed her it took many years to make amends. In truth, I feared she might still be unhappy with me, but our situation tells me otherwise.”

“You know Hecate, then?”

“Of course. The ages of time are deeper than the breadth of continents, and immortals inevitably meet now and then. I remember Bast as well, though she may not recall the little dryad who played familiar to a whole dynasty of her wizards during Egypt’s rise. My name is not uncommon among dryads, and I sometimes play at hiding the truth of myself.”

She sighed, and paused to take a sip from her cup. I did the same, and found that it was surprisingly good tea. Not that I’m an expert on the stuff.

“Usually I dance around this issue, but I suppose it’s best to be direct with you,” she said. “You ask how old I am, Daniel? I cannot give you a number, for I am older than calendars. Older than writing, or cities, or the working of metal. Once I would have said older than men, for I was already ancient when the first hunters wandered in from the coast to explore the high desert where my sisters and I lived. We called them fire binders, and feared their powers of destruction almost as much as we yearned for their rugged bodies.”

Jesus fuck. She was as old as the titans. Maybe older. When did humans first colonize that part of the New World? Twelve thousand years ago?

“Why would someone like you want to be my familiar, Alanna?”

A melancholy little smile touched her lips.

“You think me ancient and wise, now. A great spirit of the wilds, who should be beyond the petty affairs of men. But I am nothing of the sort, Daniel. Dryads are simple creatures at heart. We hunt. We mate. We dance together beneath the warm summer sun, and stand undaunted against nature’s wrath. But at the end of the day, we’re only tree spirits. We exist in the same eternal now as the beasts of the field or the plants we spring from, and the power of change is beyond us. Ages before the first men came to the high desert, I had long since explored everything I was or am or could ever hope to be. I found the highest excellence that it was in me to reach and rested there, thinking myself content.

“Then the fire binders came, and things changed. We found new desires in ourselves that we had never known existed, and surrendered ourselves willingly to their embrace. We learned of seduction and romance, discovered tools and strategy, and heard tales of faraway lands. I grew jealous of men, and their power to walk the Earth as they will. Then one year a young shaman invented a spell that let me pick up my tree, and follow him to his tribe’s encampment.

“Invention. So few people understand what a wonder that is. The world has changed so much these last few millennia, and there is nothing I love more than seeing what new thing men will bring into the world next.”

“There’s going to be a lot of that here,” I said.

This time her smile was happy, bordering on gleeful. “I know! I’ve seen this before, but never to such an extreme. You’ve brought some vast trove of new things with you to this city, and you’re unleashing them on the world just as fast as you can turn knowledge into spellwork. I can’t wait to see what comes next!”

“I would imagine so. But what does all that have to do with being a familiar?”

Her face fell, and she sighed.

“That is not a happy topic, but I suppose it would be too much to hope that you would already know. Daniel, I’m a spirit of the deep wilderness. You’ve heard Pelagia complain about her poor grasp of civilized mysteries, but she is practically human compared to me. Of my own self I cannot understand numbers, or writing, or any sort of society more complex than a pack of predators. I can barely comprehend music, or piece together what a painting is supposed to show. When I contemplate your more subtle works I might as well be a cow, staring on in blank incomprehension.

“But when I’m bonded with a wizard, I can share a taste of humanity’s mysteries. Fill me generously with your power, and I can regain all of the lore that I have mastered and lost again so many times. Even an impersonal bond will give me a comfortable grasp of writing and music, two priceless treasures to one who can so seldom enjoy them. Bind me closely, with affection and shared pleasure as well as magic, and I can even hope to embrace the mystery of invention from time to time.”

I looked around at her unconventional home, and tried to imagine what an existence like that would be like.

“I think I can understand how that would be worth it to you,” I began.

“Oh, do not think it some great sacrifice,” she interrupted. “My kind were born from the dreams of men, Daniel, and what man dreams of a woman who does not care for his embrace? I am more wolf than dog, but I think you are strong enough to face me without fear. Treat me well, and I shall be very happy indeed.”

“It sounds like you do this a lot,” I said.

“Not as often as I would like. My power is too great a prize to lesser wizards, who have not the strength to properly bond me. All too many of them would chain me in some lightless cellar instead, a mere resource to tap for magic when they need it. So I place myself where circumstances seem favorable, and watch for opportunities. But good ones come only rarely. When the stars align I seize the chance, and snatch a brief span of happiness with some man of exceptional kindness or insight. Then he inevitably dies, leaving me to mourn in solitude for a century or two before I gather the courage to try again.”

I studied her face carefully. “You know, I’m immortal.”

“No, you are unaging,” she corrected. “You can call yourself immortal when the utter destruction of your body will no longer mean your end. But you’ve a spark of divine power now, and Hecate favors you. If I guard you diligently, perhaps you will live for more than a scant few centuries. I would very much like to have a partner who doesn’t die on me, Daniel. There is much that I would be willing to offer such a man, that I hold back from more temporary affairs.”

“Oh?” I had to admit, I was curious about that. I could see a lot of young wizards using dryad familiars for sex, but I had my hands full in that department already.

“You are a marvelous war wizard, but far too often you fight alone,” she said. “With me, that will never happen again. But any dryad could be your armor, or a weapon in your hand. The true boon I offer my wizards is knowledge. For I have witnessed the whole history of the world, from the very dawn of this marvel you call civilization. I have seen every corner of the Nine Worlds, lived among all of their peoples, and immersed myself in the inner workings of almost every great school of magic. I know the truths that lurk behind the lies spun by a thousand generations of vainglorious victors, and the dark secrets they think long forgotten. Not just the wars of kings and emperors, but those of wizards, gods and the powers of darkness.

“Usually I speak little on such topics, for to reveal too much would yet draw the ire of half the great powers in the world. But this is Ragnarok, and you are a wizard of such power and insight as to make a worthy partner even for the world’s oldest dryad. Accept me as your familiar, and I shall answer any question you care to ask.”

I put my hand on hers. “That’s a tempting offer, Alanna. But you know, you don’t have to bribe me with arcane lore. I was already going to say yes.”

She took my hand in a surprisingly strong grip, and smiled. “I thought you might. But I wanted to make the offer. I have been very impressed by your works here in Kozalin, and especially by your efforts to forge a new tribe of such disparate peoples. I want to see you succeed, and I would be more than just another spear in your army.

“But there is one thing I must ask of you. I know you have a young romance with your coven to nurture, and Pelagia’s grove to minister to. But if I’m to be your familiar, I need to be close to you. In every sense. I don’t expect you to discover some grand passion for me overnight. But I need to be allowed to live with you, work with you, and be a part of your life. Let me be your armor when you go out to do battle, and your companion when you’re far from home. Let whatever affection or friendship might kindle between us grow as it will. And as I am in the end a dryad, don’t forget to give me a good dicking now and then.”

She gave me a teasing grin at that last bit, and I chuckled. That wasn’t exactly a great sacrifice. She might not have the voluptuous beauty of the nymphs, but she was attractive enough in her own way. Lean and fit, with tanned skin and a neat braid of dark brown hair, she could have stepped off the cover of some fitness magazine back home.

“I can do that,” I said. “What are you doing for the next hour?”

She took my hands, and pulled me to my feet. “Let’s find out.”

Chapter 6

Alanna’s bedroom was as oddly appointed as the rest of her bower. A flat expanse of wood grew seamlessly from one of the walls, extending well out into the room before dipping to meet the floor. Thick posts rose up from the corners, and a mattress big enough for three covered the flat area, but the whole thing was a good bit higher than the beds back home. Another flat surface sprouted from the wall at one side to serve as a nightstand, and a glass decanter of water sat in a little recessed nook behind that.

One wall of the room was completely covered with a row of tall wardrobe doors, with drawers below them and smaller cupboards above. The rest were bare, smooth wood, just like the floor. The overall impression was an odd blend of stark simplicity and homey comfort, like a cabin in the middle of the desert. The sourceless flood of warm sunlight that filled the space only reinforced that impression.

Alanna led me to the bed, and sat next to me with an expectant look.

“You know, it occurs to me that most of what I know about familiar bindings comes from the writings of people who were hunting for slaves or mana batteries,” I told her. “You’ve obviously got more experience with this than I do. What do you think is the right way to do this?”

“Why Daniel, do you mean to say that you’ve never had a familiar before?”

“Well, um, yes,” I admitted, feeling strangely embarrassed.

Her smile turned impish. “Fear not, my wizard. Many would say that choosing an older woman for your first time is a wise decision. I shall be quite gentle,” she teased.

I chuckled. “That’s good. Wouldn’t want to bruise my fragile ego.”

She leaned into my side, and ran her hand over my chest. “Not too fragile, I hope. But in all seriousness, a gradual approach is best. With your sorcery to aid the process, I would say begin by giving me a taste of your magic. Like before, but not so much all at once.”

I must be getting used to women throwing themselves at me, because it felt completely natural to put my arm around her and cup her cheek in my hand when she looked up at me. I opened the connection, and let a trickle of mana flow into her.

“Like this?” I asked.

“You can give me more than that, Daniel. I’m not some little flower spirit.”

I widened the flow considerably, until I was giving her something like what I’d use to charge Avilla’s mana reserves. Alanna sighed happily, and rubbed her cheek against my hand.

“Mm, yes, that’s good,” she purred. “Does your sorcery show you how your magic moves within me?”

“Yes, although I’m not sure how to describe what I see. My anatomy lessons never covered a dryad’s metaphysical organs. It looks like there’s a whole expanse of something that was asleep, or in hibernation maybe, and this is waking it up.”

“Exactly. Ah, it has been too long. When you filled me so suddenly before the battle I overflowed, and most of the mana simply drained into my body. For a stable, lasting familiar bond we need all those sleeping parts to fully awaken, and bask in your power.”

“What does it feel like?” I asked curiously.

“Something like getting the best massage in the world, while you drift along half asleep,” she said. “And, I’m told, something like waking up to a beautiful woman worshiping your manhood.”

“How did you come by that comparison?” I asked.

“From the lips of a man who had a talent for empathy,” she said. “But this is no time to speak of past wizards. Do you see that connection that’s begun reaching out, blindly trying to find you? If you were after an impersonal sort of bond you’d loop that back on itself, or simply bind it in place.”

“That sounds like a cruel thing to do to a dryad,” I observed. “Especially your familiar.”

“Men are often cruel,” she said. “Sometimes they even have reasons. For a more personal bond you could lay your head next to mine, and let my magic eventually find you. But shared pleasure makes for a stronger connection.”

“That makes sense,” I said.

I kissed her.

Her lips were soft against mine, parting in warm welcome at my touch. She moved against me, confident and unhurried, hungry for more but content to savor every delight in turn. I finally came up for air to find that she was in my lap, grinding against me while I panted for breath.

My hand went to her braid, and I tugged her head back to bare her throat. Her breath caught. My teeth drew a groan of excitement from her lips.

The connection was beginning to form now, and I could feel her desires through it. A simple, earthy enjoyment of physical pleasure, with no hint of the undertones that made sex so complicated for humans. There was no shame or embarrassment in her, no judgement about my worth as a lover or worries about the future. Just an uncomplicated animal desire to feel me inside her, and finish what we’d begun.

I went for the buttons of her dress, but I didn’t have to figure them out. Instead the garment faded away like mist, and Alanna grinned at my startled expression.

“I’ve got to learn how to do that one of these days,” I said.

“Alas, my method would not work for you.” Deft fingers worked at my shirt, and in a moment she had it off me.

Her breasts were just big enough to fill my hands. She groaned at my touch, throwing her head back and pressing them into my palms.

“That’s the way,” she said. “Touch me, and let me touch you. I’ve wanted you since the first moment I saw you, Daniel.”

She ran her nails up my sides, and moved in for a taste of my neck. It was a moment before I could find the breath to speak again.

“You could have said something sooner,” I gasped out.

“It was too soon. You were busy, and I needed to be sure. Even now I feel that I’m rushing, but I don’t want to wait any longer.”

She suddenly pulled away, and sank to her knees in the floor beside the bed. Before I could ask what she was doing she was already working one of my boots off.

Our connection strengthened, and I caught the edge of her deeper desires. A heady rush of longing for the primal intimacy of a healthy bond, so like a human’s desire for romance but at the same time so different. And beyond that, a deep ache for the return of lost joys whose nature she could barely grasp at on her own. All the arts and insights she could only have by embracing her nature, and baring her soul to someone who had the power to abuse that trust if he wanted to.

I put my hands on her head, because it felt right, and unbound her braid with a bit of force magic so I could run my hands through her hair. The magic was still flowing, but letting it run out through my fingers made the connection more personal.

She got my boot off, and paused for a moment to savor the touch.

“Kind master,” she murmured.

“Happy familiar,” I countered.

She smiled, and went for the other boot. “I certainly hope so. Now get those pants off, master. I don’t want to wait any longer.”

I started working on my belt as I answered. “Master seems more like what a powerful asshole would demand than what you’re actually feeling. There’s some love of being chased and caught, sure, and wanting to belong, and a lot of warm fuzzy feelings for smart and powerful guys. But that all feels like it should add up to something different than ‘master’.

She tossed the other boot over her shoulder, and helped me get my pants off. When I was naked she ran her hands up my thighs, and looked up at me with a playful smile.

“My wizard,” she said, her tone filling the words with possessive warmth. “That is the sum of my heart’s feelings. Will you take me as your familiar in the way that I love best, and be my wizard in return? Will you share magic and wisdom and pleasure with me, in a bond that flows both ways? Will you offer leadership in return for loyalty, with no other compulsions or vows? Will you accept my protection, and protect me in turn, in hopes of a long and fruitful life together?”

“Yes,” I said. “That sounds like a much better arrangement than the kind wizards usually make.”

Her smile grow. She rose, and pushed me back onto the bed.

“Wonderful. Then shape your binding like this, my wizard, and our pleasure shall seal the pact.”

She spun out her half of the spell with as deft a touch as I’d ever seen, and held it as I studied the structure and blended my own magic into it. Unlike any bond I’d seen before it was designed so that either of us could release it at will, although it would take a few hours to completely unravel. Its major function was just to protect the natural connection she’d already formed with me, turning it into a mental and magical link that could stretch over vast distances and resist any attempt to sever it. As long as that was in place no other binding would be able to anchor itself to her, so she wouldn’t have to worry about being enslaved if she got caught by some ambitious wizard.

Not that she was in much danger of that regardless. As we wove the spell I realized that she was far stronger than she looked, and endlessly devious at preparing defenses against unwanted manipulation. There were internal wards and barriers woven all through her soul, and what I was seeing now was just the part of her that could walk around pretending to be an animal. The part that was really a tree was much harder to get a read on, but I had a vague sense of hidden depths and vast reserves of power slowly accumulated over the passage of eons. I’d almost pity the fool who slapped a standard dryad binding on her and expected it to work.

As for the leadership part, it was a delicately nuanced structure that reminded me of the binding promises so many magical creatures in this world made. Deserve my loyalty, and you will have it, it seemed to say. Lead me well, and I shall follow you happily and wholeheartedly. But if I find you unworthy my loyalty will fade, and our bond with it.

I could live with that. But there was an unexpected complication hidden among the details.

She mounted me as the spellwork settled into place, and sank down onto me with an appreciative groan.

“I love a wizard with a nice, big cock,” she said. “I hope you’re as good as they say, because my hunger will take some doing to satisfy.”

She rolled her hips, working herself on me in a way that was incredibly distracting. For a moment I almost lost myself in the delicious sensation of slick wet heat sliding in every direction around me. But I pushed through it, and managed to wrap my arms around her and roll us both over.

“Oh!” She gave a delighted squeal, and wriggled in my grasp. Testing the strength of my hold, without seriously trying to get out of it.

I shook my head to clear it, and pinned her hands above her head.

“One thing,” I growled. “I’m the one who’s on top here, you mischievous wench.”

She giggled, and wrapped her long legs around my waist. “So you noticed?”

“The lust effect that triggers on whoever finishes first? Yeah, I noticed.”

“Most men need the inspiration to keep up with me,” she said. “But if you want your my passion tied to the state of your manhood, you need only outlast me. Would you like that? To know that I will get wet for you every time you look upon me with desire, and burn for your touch for as long as you wish to keep going?”

She squeezed me with her inner muscles, and started to rock her hips. It was impossible not to respond, thrusting deeper into her heated depths.

“So that’s how you like to play, is it? Challenge accepted,” I growled.

If she’d been the first woman I had in this world I never would have been able to focus. But even her masterful technique wasn’t nearly as distracting as Cerise’s lust aura, and the crazy physical changes that her demonic magic manifested when she got worked up. Holding myself back only took a tiny application of flesh magic, and that was all I needed.

She gasped when I took control of our coupling, overriding the movement of her hips to thrust into her hard and fast. Then she was matching my pace, hips working automatically while her mouth fell open and her eyes rolled. A long, breathy moan escaped her lips, and just like that I could feel her struggling to hold back her release.

For a dryad her self-control was incredible. Usually the little minxes can get off from a heated look, and she was every bit as responsive as her younger sisters. But she held out through the first heady rush of sensation, while our bond deepened and my sense of her body grew more intimate with each passing breath.

“Yes!” She hissed as I adjusted my stroke. “There! Just like that! It’s been so long, I’m as tight as a virgin for you, Daniel. Stretch me out, and make me a sheath for your mighty weapon.”

I leaned down to claim her lips. She responded eagerly, arching her back to rub her firm breasts against my chest. But still, she held herself back.

Then I realized that I could feel the stubborn knot of resistance inside her, through our growing familiar bond. I brushed against it, gently, and it trembled in response. A jolt of deeper, more primal ecstasy shot through her, and she broke away from the kiss.

“Yes!” She gasped, her eyes wild with passion. “That’s it. Do it, my wizard.”

The first time we’d made a temporary bond, I’d realized that I could reach through it and move her limbs as if they were mine. Now I reached deeper, and made her stop holding back.

She climaxed instantly, with a joyous cry of triumph that echoed off the walls around us. We fell together, the bond engulfing us both, and I held her soul in my hands.

Much later, we laid together on her bed recovering from our exertions. Alanna was practically purring with contentment, and I was basking in the afterglow that only comes from amazing sex. She rested her head on my shoulder, running her hand idly through the hairs on my chest.

“What a wonderful beginning,” she murmured. “I had hardly dared hope for such a performance, or such a satisfying bond. Did I please you well, my wizard?”

“You were amazing,” I told her. “Hell, that was so intense I think it echoed back through my coven bond.”

“It wouldn’t surprise me,” she said. “Coven members don’t have to share a familiar, but they can if they so desire. I’m sure your ladies felt our working, though they may not recognize its nature.”

“Sounds like I should take you upstairs and introduce you around,” I said. “Dinner isn’t that far off, anyway. Um, do you eat? I mean, I know you can, but is that something dryads need to do or is it just for pleasure?”

“I can live on soil and sunlight if I dwell within my tree, but if I’m to walk about like a human I need to eat like one as well,” she explained.

“Good to know. You don’t look like you’re going to be moving anytime soon.”

“It’s your fault for spoiling me so well. I just want to lie in your arms and drift off to sleep. But I suppose you’re right. We don’t know how much of an echo your ladies felt, and it would be rude to leave them wondering for too long. Help me up?”

“Sure. Just as soon as I muster enough willpower to move.”

Eventually we did get ourselves going. I helped Alanna out of bed, and she helped me find my clothes. She never stopped touching me, and half the time she was draped against my side or back with her arms around me, but somehow she managed not to get in my way.

Apparently she was the clingy type, but I didn’t mind. Although I wondered about the practicalities. When I was finally dressed I glanced over at her lean, naked body, and raised an eyebrow.

“Are you planning to go out like that?”

She smiled up at me, and a fresh outfit materialized around her. A simple halter top and miniskirt of soft leather, like most of Corinna’s grove preferred. This time I could see her magic better, but that only made the trick more impressive. She was somehow abusing the magic that let her step in and out of her tree, and using it to summon items from her bower. But the details of the effect were as intricate as any wizard’s spell, and obviously not something dryads naturally learned to do.

“You’re basically the dryad version of a wizard, aren’t you?” I asked.

She wrapped herself around my arm with a smug grin. “Praise me more, my wizard. Aren’t my works amazing, for one who can only borrow human mysteries? My powers are more like sorcery than wizardry, in truth. But you’ve given me such gifts that I have high hopes for finding improvements. With your sorcery over mana I can see myself more clearly than I’ve managed in ages.”

She pulled me out of her tree, and we strolled up the path chatting happily. A couple of Corinna’s dryads looked over curiously, and waved at us. Alanna gave them a thumbs-up, and they cheered and ran off to talk to the others.

“They look excited,” I commented.

“I could hardly hide my true nature from my grove sisters,” she explained. “They’ve been encouraging me to pursue you from the moment we arrived. You made quite an impression when you created this refuge for us all.”

“I noticed,” I said. “Pelagia and her girls are kind of overwhelming about showing their gratitude. The next time they hold a revel I should bring you to run interference.”

“Better Elin to split their attention, and Cerise to turn the tables. I’d simply add to their numbers.”

I laughed. But I had to admit, that was quite an image.

Sefwin was waiting at the palace entrance, and she seemed a bit wide-eyed when I introduced Alanna as my new familiar.

“I see the inquisitive shadows have been prying,” Alanna said once we’d passed through the checkpoint. “She clearly knows me.”

“Yeah, Nethwillin is basically a ninja clan, aren’t they?”

“Ninja? That’s an interesting comparison. I’d say your arrow is close to the mark, but not quite a bull’s eye. True ninja live in service to a lord who cares little for their lives. Nethwillin’s elves serve their own clan, and they’re quite serious about the clan’s reciprocal obligation to its… members…”

She trailed off, and stopped dead in the middle of the corridor.

“Alanna? Something wrong?”

“Feudalism. Face. Exchange rates. Inflation. Freya’s juicy tits, I understand again!”

She turned on me, and kissed me fiercely.

I held her close, and ran my hand through her hair the way she liked. “Isn’t that supposed to happen?”

“Not so fast!” She exclaimed. “Usually it takes months, if not years. It seems your excessive power is good for more than I realized.”

“Excessive, huh? Yeah, being stupidly strong is good for all kinds of things.”

I picked her up, and casually threw her over my shoulder. She giggled happily, and wiggled in my grip.

“Careful, or you’ll give the help a show,” she said. “I’m not wearing panties.”

“And who’s fault is that?” I asked.

“Yours,” she declared. “Obviously I can’t have anything in the way, when you might need to bend me over for a quick romp at any moment.”

Cerise’s laugh met me as I entered the living room. “Sounds like someone has the right idea, big guy. Who do you have there? One of the dryads?”

The room was intended to be a shared living area for my coven, located between the kitchen and our private suites. Avilla had only finished furnishing it a few days ago, but now there were two couches and a collection of plush chairs surrounding a big fireplace. The rug that covered the middle of the room was felwolf pelt, incredibly thick and plush, and much bigger than any bearskin.

Cerise and Beri were sitting together on one of the couches, with Tina stretched out on the rug nearby. Beri’s left hand and arm were covered in bloody scratches that Cerise seemed to be cleaning, and she clutched a silver knife in her right hand.

“Looks like someone has been busy,” I commented. I put Alanna down, and rested my hands on her shoulders. “Tina, Beri, I’d like to introduce Alanna, my new familiar. Alanna, Tina here is one of my coven mates, and Beri is one of Cerise’s acolytes. I assume you and Cerise have met?”

“Oh, shit!” Cerise exclaimed. “Congratulations, Alanna. So that’s what that weird surge was.”

“Cerise was quite energetic about sampling all of Corinna’s dryads,” Alanna said with an impish smile. “She called me ‘fingers’ for a few days before she got around to learning my name.”

“Hey, you’ve got magic digits,” Cerise shot back, completely unembarrassed. “Besides, I let you get away with calling me ‘Lady Tail’. I guess you couldn’t get enough, so you had to get closer access.”

Alanna chuckled, and draped herself against me. “My wizard has satisfied my passions quite thoroughly, Cerise,” she purred.

“He does that,” Tina agreed, coming to her feet. “Welcome to the family, Alanna.”

She enveloped the dryad in a warm hug. Alanna seemed taken aback for a moment, before she relaxed and returned the gesture.

“Thank you, Tina. You really are as kind as everyone says, aren’t you?”

“She is,” Beri said, fondness and exasperation warring in her voice. “No matter what the situation, she just wants everyone to be friends.”

“What happened to your hand, Beri?” I asked. “Do you need healing?”

Beri hesitated, but Cerise stepped in to explain. “Oh, she’s embarrassed because she flubbed her first imp. Little bastard scratched her up some before she could cut his throat. Next time you’ll make the bindings tighter, won’t you Beri?”

The younger brunette flushed. “Yes, my lady. Only, weren’t you supposed to be supervising?”

“That doesn’t mean I’m going to fix every little mistake for you. You’ll never learn anything that way.”

“You were just distracted, weren’t you?” Tina said.

“Hah!” Cerise looked away, and crossed her arms over her chest. “As if a trained witch would lose focus so easily.”

“It was so good I had to change my panties,” Tina argued.

“Heh. Yeah. Um, anyway, in all seriousness, welcome to the family, Alanna. Does this mean you’re going to be leaving Corinna’s grove? Because I notice you’ve replaced all the magic I was giving you with Daniel’s sorcery.”

“Oh, Cerise, I didn’t mean that as a rejection,” Alanna said. “It was a side effect of forming the familiar bond. I do expect to leave the grove now, but I would welcome any opportunity to grow closer to my wizard’s ladies. Especially you. I’ve enjoyed our time together, although given your nature I’m not sure what to expect in our future. I’m aware that a familiar bond can be shared across a coven, but you could almost become a familiar yourself.”

“Yeah, that’s kind of a tempting thought sometimes,” Cerise admitted. “But I like to make my guy work for it more than that. So you’d consider a group bond?”

“I’d like to know you all better first,” Alanna said. “But it isn’t unthinkable. Although the usual reasons for such an arrangement hardly apply in this case.”

“An understatement if there ever was one,” Elin’s voice came from the hallway leading back to our apartments. She emerged into the living room, looking mussed and a bit disgruntled in one of her comfortable lounging robes. “A familiar, Daniel? Really? What on Earth could you possibly need a pet dryad for? You already have more raw power than you could ever need.”

Tina frowned, and went to hug the irate faerie. “Elin? What’s wrong?”

Elin sighed. “I’m sorry, Tina. I’m just out of sorts. I’m still trying to adjust to life with the coven, and Daniel is already bringing in some new conquest. Honestly, what use is a dryad anyway?”

“I can armor our wizard when he goes into battle,” Alana said, sounding surprisingly calm. “It seems to me that he badly needs better protection, and his magic is better suited to destruction that defending himself.”

Elin rolled her eyes. “Wooden armor? Really? Adept Frobisher’s research clearly established that dryad armor is barely superior to ordinary steel. Even basic runic enchantments are superior in every respect. Minor tree spirits just don’t have the mana capacity to hold up a strong protective ward for any length of time.”

Avilla came up the hall behind Elin, and stopped to take in the conversation.

“Frobisher was an idiot,” Alanna scoffed. “He lacked the skills to conduct diplomacy with any established grove, so he bred himself a gaggle of pear trees for his experiments. Pear trees! Yes, they grow quickly enough to be convenient even for humans, but they’re hardly more than bush spirits. Gobbel’s work with the oaks of Keffel Falls may be inferior in form, but his results are far more representative of mature dryads.”

“Gobbel’s methodology was atrocious,” Elin protested. “He claimed a peak mana throughput of over six hundred thaums for some of his subjects!”

“That sounds about right, for a mature huntress type,” Cerise said. “But I bet Alanna is higher.”

“It depends on the strength of my wizard,” Alanna said. “Unbonded, I reach my limit at perhaps a thousand thaums. With Daniel’s strength nurturing my roots? Give me a week, and I shall be ready to turn a blow from Jormungandr.”

Elin blinked at her uncertainly. “That’s absurd. Even under Gobbel’s most credulous extrapolations you’d have to be thousands of years old to have that level of strength.”

Avilla choked. I was concerned for a moment, before I realized she was trying not to laugh. Elin glanced back at her with a puzzled frown, and Avilla put a gentle hand on her shoulder.

“Elin, dear, I think you’re arguing with one of those legendary spirits you read about in ancient tales. Perhaps you should calm down, and find out who she is?”

Elin opened her mouth to argue, and abruptly closed it again. She closed her eyes for a moment, took a deep breath, and ran her hands threw her hair.

“I’m being rude, aren’t I?” She said, “I apologize. No matter how I try, the monster within seems to leak out now and then. I’m Elin.”

“I’m not offended,” Alanna said, crossing the room to offer her hand. “In truth I find myself impressed by your self-control. I am Alanna Firescorn, and I fear your coven-mate is correct about my nature.”

Elin’s jaw dropped, and her eyes went wide as saucers. “What? Really? Oh gosh, I’m so embarrassed.”

“This is why we have hospitality customs,” Avilla said, patting her on the shoulder. “I take it she’s famous?”

“She’s supposed to be a myth!” Elin exclaimed. “She’s mentioned in some of the oldest histories still extant. At the dawn of history she was known as an unkillable nature spirit of unthinkable antiquity.”

“Ah, scholarship is such a fascinating thing,” Alanna said. “It was strange enough when the bards arose, and suddenly one’s deeds were preserved in song for generations. It’s still strange to think that my doings in ages past are recorded in books that anyone might read.”

“At least it’s only a few scholars who read them,” I said. “Imagine how much worse it would be, if books were so cheap that anyone could afford them.”

“I’m not sure if that would be better or worse,” Alanna mused. “My anonymity would be lost in such an age, but the same goes for others. There are so many embarrassing incidents I might have avoided, if I’d known who I was speaking to at the time.”

Elin covered her face with her hands, and whimpered. “I’m so sorry!”

“Peace, Elin. You are the wife of my wizard, and I would not have hard feelings come between us. Old I may be, but I am no goddess or great spirit. I am only a dryad in the end, and you need have no fear of me. May we not be friends?”

“Friends? With Alanna Firescorn? I, but, well… yes?”

“Wonderful. But now I must face the mistress of the house.”

“Oh, don’t be silly,” Avilla said, enveloping my dryad in a warm hug. “Welcome to the family, Alanna. Thank you for being so gentle about entering my domain.”

“Of course,” Alanna said. “I wouldn’t want to cause conflict. You can feel it, then? I wasn’t certain how far along the path you were.”

“I couldn’t possibly miss it,” she said. “You’re like a warm breath of spring.”

“What do you mean?” Cerise asked curiously.

“Oh, she’s inside herself somehow,” Avilla said. “Her body is in her bower even when she’s walking the world, so I felt her domain touching mine the moment she entered the part of palace that I’ve claimed. You don’t need to hold yourself so aloof for my sake, dear. I don’t mind if we rub up against each other a little.”

“Thank you, Avilla. It would be nice to relax my grip a bit, but I didn’t want to presume. It can be an intimate thing, much like blending magic.”

“Is it? Well, perhaps we should try it gradually, and see how it feels. If it’s too distracting I might need to leave a patch of the garden unclaimed for your tree. But if we have a good resonance it would be nice to lean on each other a bit, don’t you think?”

“I agree,” Alanna said. “You’re a generous woman, Avilla. I wasn’t certain you’d want my tree so near your domain, let alone within it.”

“Don’t be silly,” Avilla scoffed. “As if I’d neglect my husband’s familiar. This is meant to be a permanent bond, isn’t it?”

“Yeah,” I said. “We left ourselves the option to dissolve it if things don’t work out for some reason, but I don’t see that happening.”

“Then this is your home too, Alanna. Of course you can plant your tree in the garden.”

“Thank you, Avilla. Give me a day to bid farewell to my comrades in the Fangs of the Forest, and I shall do just that. Perhaps we can pick a spot together? I’m afraid I’m not much to look at, so I wouldn’t want to mar your gardening plans.”

“Now you’re just fishing for compliments,” Tina teased. “I hope I’m half as pretty as you when I’m a bazillion years old. Come on, why don’t I show you the baths while Avilla starts on dinner.”

Chapter 7

Alanna looked on curiously as I put the finishing touches on my latest enchantment factory.

The dryad was fascinated by my enchantment technique, and I’d quickly found that she was happy to sit and watch me work for hours at a time. She was a very tactile person, too. Always eager for a hug or a bit of cuddling, and a bit reluctant to let me out of her sight. It might have been annoying in another woman, but Alanna never demanded my attention when it was needed elsewhere. She just followed me through my day, staying out of the way and taking everything in with eager eyes.

She’d had a lot to watch. I’d thrown up four more keeps in the last few days, as well as a heated pavilion outside my own gates for the market vendors. That got numerous shopkeepers, the district’s detachment of the city watch, and the members of several crafting guilds into secure living conditions. I’d started with the guilds related to shipbuilding and maintenance, because keeping the port in operation was a high priority for me. But I’d also found time to make an enchantment factory for big outdoor space heaters, and gotten a work crew to start setting them up along major streets.

Then I’d spent a couple of days expanding the arcology block on my island. The whole land mass was now covered by the giant structure of stone and metal, although the interior was mostly unfinished. I’d extended the street at ground level into a loop that ran all the way around the agricultural area, lined with empty spaces that could be turned into shops and businesses. I’d laid out another road loop up on the 10th floor, for establishments catering exclusively to my island’s inhabitants. Then I’d built a hanger for the Intrepid on top of the structure, and spent an evening turning some of that vast empty space into another farming complex.

But the political situation in the city was starting to heat up, and I didn’t think I’d be able to avoid open conflict for much longer. Duke Beck had taken control of the granary, and slapped new restrictions on withdrawals just after my Nethwillin conspirators had managed to sneak off with a load of grain. Duke Fisker was recruiting soldiers, and rumor had it more than half of the troops that remained in the city were now under his banner. Meanwhile the Conclave had sealed the gates of the Iron Citadel, and rumor had it there was some sort of internal power struggle playing out within their walls.

My own forces had grown considerably since I first came to Kozalin, but four hundred riflemen and a few armored skimmers still wasn’t much to work with when it came to a power struggle on this scale. I had doubts about even keeping the harbor district secure if the other factions started throwing their weight around. Hence my current project.

“This is a most devious working,” Alanna said from her position in Cerise’s lap. Both of them were naked, not having bothered to dress again after they ambushed me an hour ago.

Elin and Avilla were still a bit unsure about this new addition to the family, but Cerise and Tina had certainly given her a warm reception. It had barely taken them a day to seduce her, not that she’d made them work for it much. She might be an ancient and wise spirit, but she was still a dryad.

“Isn’t it, though?” Cerise said. “This is how he makes enough artifacts to equip the whole army. He makes these enchantment factories, and they just crank out as many copies as we need.”

“Don’t they grow weary, from giving birth to such multitudes?” Alanna asked.

Cerise had a giggling fit at that, and couldn’t manage enough breath to answer.

“It isn’t alive,” I explained. “It’s more like a clock. You’ve seen clocks, right? All those complicated metal parts moving around, and it can tell time even though there’s nothing in there that knows what an hour is.”

“Ugh. Please, don’t try to explain it any more, Daniel. It makes my head hurt to think of such things, and I’m content to take you at your word. I don’t quite understand what this is for, though. It conjures a giant metal box, that floats in the air?”

Yes, I’d finally figured out how to automate the process of conjuring a vehicle that included moving parts.

The solution I’d hit on required a longer series of manufacturing steps than my previous efforts, but it was still pretty simple compared to some of the software I’d worked on back home. First it would conjure the main body of the skimmer, and put the warmth and levitation enchantments on it. Then it would conjure the hatches and other moving parts one by one, using the existing contours of the hull to guide their placement. Each copy would come out with slight differences, since my conjuration spells couldn’t match the sub-millimeter precision of modern manufacturing. But using each piece as a guide for the next meant they’d all end up fitting together properly anyway.

A bigger challenge was the fact that the factory had to have an open space in the middle big enough to hold the vehicle it was making, and it was hard to get enchantment spells to work over any significant distance. That was one reason that I’d come up with a new, more compact  skimmer design instead of just copying the ones I’d made by hand.

The new skimmers were considerably smaller than the old ones, more like an armored car than a proper IFV. At the front there were seats for a driver and commander, with narrow windows giving them a view ahead and to the sides. A turret on top held the gunner’s position, and an open space at the back had room for four infantry or a couple of tons of supplies. The main way in and out was a large hatch in the rear, but the gunner and commander positions also had smaller hatches.

The main weapon was a cannon in the turret, with a caliber I estimated at 40mm. There was a selector switch that controlled whether it conjured solid or explosive rounds, which was another mark of my increasing skill with enchantment factories. When I’d first started to build these things the indirection involved in making an enchantment factory that makes enchantment factories that make magic items would have been too much. But that was before I figured out how to translate some of my experience with computer programming into making more structured enchantments. Now that I could apply basic structured programming techniques to the design of an enchantment, I could manage effects that had a lot more complexity to them.

I’d taken advantage of that to add some useful secondary features to the new design. The commander’s position had controls for a forward-facing flamer mounted on the hood, just behind the ram that would hopefully allow it to plow through light buildings or small trees if necessary. There was a secondary system that would engulf the whole vehicle in fire for a few seconds, to ward off swarming attacks by enemy infantry. It even had headlights, and a high-powered spotlight mounted coaxial with the cannon. The only thing it lacked compared to the armored vehicles I was used to was a good machine gun, and I figured the flamer and explosive cannon rounds would be a decent substitute.

Well, it also needed a radio. That was next on my list of inventions to work on.

Markus wanted to stuff seven men into each vehicle, and have the infantry dismount to fight. Demetrios was leaning towards a more mechanized setup, with just two infantry riding in the back to leave more room for supplies. I figured either approach would work well enough, so I wasn’t too concerned about the details. Just having an adequate number of armored vehicles would keep most fights from happening.

A wizard might be willing to fight an unfamiliar ‘golem’, but most fighting men have a keen sense of self-preservation. No one was going to be eager to fight a giant mass of armor with swords and spears.

“It’s sort of like a boat,” I told Alanna. “It’s enclosed to protect the crew from an enemy’s weapons. One of the men steers it, and the others use magic weapons to fight.”

“That explains the flame enchantments,” she said. “What do you call these fearsome beasts of war?”

I pulled the big lever that activated the factory, and stepped back to watch it work. What would you call these things? They’d end up about the length of a large van, although they were wider and a good bit taller than that. Still significantly smaller than the military vehicles I was familiar with, since they didn’t need to devote space to an engine or fuel tank. I suppose the Army would call it an IFV, but Varmland didn’t share America’s addiction to military acronyms.

“An armored skimmer,” I decided. “I’ll let the men suggest a name for this particular design. I’m sure they’ll come up with something suitably military.”

“You just don’t want to bother thinking up a name,” Cerise chuckled. “Seriously, Daniel, how can a wizard suck so bad at naming things?”

“Hey! I named the Intrepid, didn’t I?”

“Only because I pushed you. You’ve never named any of the smaller vehicles you made. The way I hear it, you weren’t even going to name Grinder until Avilla said you should.”

I shrugged. “Well, I suppose it’s just not something I care about. Besides, by the time one project is finished and ready for that I’m usually off to the next one.”

That prediction was proved accurate not half an hour later, when my first successful test run was interrupted by frantic knocking at the door. Cerise and Alanna were kissing again by that point, slowly working themselves up for another round. There weren’t too pleased at the interruption.

“I suppose I should answer that,” I said. We were in the tower where I’d set up the other military enchantment factories, so it was probably a soldier or messenger rather than one of Avilla’s cute little maids.

Instead of dressing, Cerise just sent a tendril of shadow snaking across the floor to grab the cloak that I’d discarded. She draped it around herself and Alanna, who seemed perfectly content with the arrangement.

Well, I guess that was good enough. I was glad I’d gotten dressed again, though. I slid the bolt back, and opened the heavy door a bit. “Yes?”

Sure enough, it was one of the garrison soldiers. “There’s an urgent message from the temple, milord. The high priest is asking you to come down as soon as you can.”

I took the scroll he offered, noting that it was sealed with a wax seal. I suppose the messenger who delivered it had talked, then.

“Did they say what this is about?” I asked as I checked the scroll for magic, and broke the seal.

“No, milord. Something hush-hush, it sounds like, but the messenger was fair frantic over it.”

The formal message wasn’t any more enlightening. An urgent request for my presence at the temple, with hints that there was some emergency only I could resolve. That was interesting. The temple had lost all of their senior leadership when Mara broke in during the Battle of the Docks, but they still had a lot of prestige. I’d half-expected one of the noble factions to use them as a go-between for secret meetings, since if they wanted a magical ally against the Conclave I was the obvious choice. But that sort of thing would hardly be an emergency.

“I suppose I’d better see what they want,” I said. “Tell the messenger he can go ahead and return to the temple. I’ll be along shortly.”

“As you say, milord.” The soldier bowed, and hurried off.

“I don’t like this,” Cerise said as I closed the door. “They’ve re-sanctified the temple, so I can’t go in there with you. What if it’s some kind of trap?”

“By who? The temple doesn’t have anyone powerful enough to be a threat to me, and neither do the nobles. The Conclave would be another story, but I can’t see the temple cooperating with them on something like that.”

“Fear not, Cerise,” Alanna said, rising to her feet. “I shall guard our wizard from all manner of ambushes and knives in the dark.”

I paused in the act of picking up my coat. “I don’t know if bringing a dryad into the temple is entirely safe either.”

“Put that silly thing away, Daniel. I can be much better armor than a scrap of leather, and none will question my presence in that form.”

Well, that was one of the reasons I’d ended up accepting her as a familiar. My own efforts to design a decent suit of plate armor hadn’t gone very well, and I was never going to have time to work out the kinks. So I set the coat aside.

“Good point. Alright, Alanna. Let’s do this.”

All of my nymphs had dryad companions, who turned into wooden armor to protect them. Alanna was happy enough to do the same thing for me, although the process was a bit disconcerting. She stepped into my embrace, molding herself against me with a happy sigh. Then her body turned soft and malleable, and engulfed me.

The nymphs I’d seen in armor all affected a style like ancient Greek soldiers, but Alanna was familiar with other designs. We’d practiced this a few times, and the one we’d settled on was basically full plate armor. The helm had an open face, but aside from that I was covered from head to toe.

The armor was a snug fit, and the inside was still as warm and soft as Alanna’s bare skin. The outside was plates of hard wood, which ordinarily wouldn’t count for much as armor. But it was held in its current shape by Alanna’s magic, and the ancient dryad could hold enormous amounts of mana. Heavy blows would be a drain on her power, but nothing short of a giant was going to crack her open.

Then she called on my earth sorcery, and clad her new shape in steel. I watched her layer structural reinforcement spells over the metal, deftly tying them to her own power reserves, and grinned.

“That’s a new trick,” I said, moving my arms to check my range of motion. Still no problems there, not that I’d expected any. Unlike me, Alanna had plenty of experience designing armor to fit any wearer. “But didn’t you brag about being better than steel?”

She didn’t have a mouth in this form, of course. But with our familiar bond fully established, she didn’t need one to talk to me.

Layers of protection, Daniel, her voice whispered in my mind. There is a counter for every defense. But a weapon meant to pierce wards will fail against a dryad’s body, and a weapon meant to slay dryads will break its teeth on cold steel. Together, with your bottomless magic filling me, we are proof against all but the most fell of weapons.

“I bet the metal is for stopping death weapons,” Cerise speculated, unable to hear Alanna’s telepathic explanation.

“Sounds like it,” I told her. “I don’t think we have to worry much about assassins while we’re like this, and if there’s some kind of ambush we can just fly away. It should be safe enough.”

She circled me, getting a good look at my armor, and rapped on the breastplate.

“Good job, Alanna,” she said. “But this gives me an idea. When you get back I want us to make you a shadow cloak to wear when you’re armored up. If we do it right I’ll be able to lurk inside the cloak in shadow form, and jump out to murderize people by surprise. Plus, it will give you better stealth the next time we get into a night battle.”

“That sounds intriguing,” I said. “Do you think we could duplicate that shadow step thing you do?”

“Maybe. That’s a sacred mystery of Hecate’s cult, but since you’re her champion I guess she wouldn’t mind. Only, power like that is supposed to be earned. We don’t have time for you to speed a week fasting and meditating, so you might just have to win it by right of conquest.”

“Wench. You just want to get chained up again.”

“Who, me? No way!” She leaned in for a kiss.

“Be careful out there, big guy,” she said. “You’ve got a lot of enemies.”

“I will,” I promised. “Tell Demetrios where I went, just in case this is advance warning of another attack on the city or something. I’ll be back soon.”

The tower I was in was mostly filled with military barracks, armories and parking space for skimmers. But there was also a giant freight elevator, big enough to lift a skimmer full of troops up to the top of the wall. So getting outside was as easy as flying up the elevator shaft, and then walking out through a guard post onto the wall.

It was a clear day for once. My breath misted in the cold air, and the wind felt like knives of ice flaying the skin off my face. I nodded to the sentries, huddled in their coats and warmth cloaks, and stepped out into the arctic chill.

My body remained comfortably warm, cradled in Alanna’s embrace. After a moment she spun together a warmth spell to protect my face as well. Unlike my own attempts in that direction it held together despite the wind, without either cutting off my air supply or roasting me. I had to stop and study the spell for a moment to see how she’d done it.

“Thank you,” I told her. “That’s a neat little spell.”

I do have some experience, she replied. But don’t let me distract you, Daniel. Focus on dealing with the work at hand, and trust me to guard you against all threats.

“I will, Alanna.”

I sent a burst of appreciation down our link, and lifted off.

Being able to fly still gave me a thrill. I climbed a thousand feet into the air in seconds, and did a couple of loops just because I felt like it. Alanna shrieked with surprised glee, sounding more like a kid on a roller coaster than an ancient nature spirit.

Next time we do this, don’t wear pants, she said breathlessly. I want to try fucking while we fly.

“How?” I asked. “You’re a suit of armor right now.”

Soft lips kissed the side of my neck.

The armor is an extension of my tree, she said. I can reach out of it without fully manifesting, if I wish.

“Sounds interesting. But let’s stay focused here. We can play later.”

It was a short flight across the city, to the great plaza near its center where the temple stood. I circled the area once, taking in the situation. There was still a huge sinkhole in the middle of the plaza, where Cerise and I had tunneled our way to the surface after destroying an undead dragon in the catacombs. The bodies left by that evening’s battles had been carted away, and someone had made a few makeshift repairs to the temple. The broken windows were boarded over, and the leaves of the main door had been lashed together with rope and hung back in position.

Big iron braziers full of burning logs had been set up outside the doors, where a squad of soldiers were standing guard. A line of ragged-looking women and children snaked into the temple through one open door, while smaller clumps of people emerged through the other at irregular intervals.

I landed in the middle of the group of soldiers. They started, hands going to their swords.

“Don’t bother, men. I’m the wizard, Daniel Black. Archpriest Edvin sent for me?”

“I never heard of the black wizard wearing no armor,” one of them said suspiciously.

“That’s not an accident. Now, are you going to tell the Archpriest that I’m here, or would you rather explain to him that I left because you thought I might be some other flying wizard?”

The sergeant gave a snort at that. “Don’t mind him, lord wizard. He’s just an idiot. This way, if you please.”

He led me into the main chamber of the temple, where a group of well-dressed men were sacrificing a sheep on the altar. The animal’s cries of pain echoed in the stone room, but the crowd of kneeling onlookers didn’t care. There were several more groups waiting for their turn, most with an animal of their own. I found myself eyeing the ones that didn’t have an obvious sacrifice as we passed. Were they just planning to make offerings of money instead of blood? Or was that boy who looked like a street urchin going to end up tied to the altar soon?

I’d expected my escort to take me to an office somewhere, but instead he led me around the crowd of worshipers towards the sanctuary in the back. To my surprise, the line of women and children I’d noted before ended there. Several priests were busy giving instructions to each group as they reached the door, and there seemed to be a lot of tearful goodbyes being said. Several times as we approached I saw a young woman break away from her friends and family, square her shoulders, and march through the door.

“What’s that all about?” I asked my escort.

“Widows for the Door of Devotion,” the sergeant explained. “Or so they say. Odds are half of them just think being a serving wench in Valhalla is safer than being here.”

How desperate would a woman have to be, to rush into the afterlife without waiting to die first? Especially since Asgard was going to be under siege by an army of dark gods and monsters soon. But then again, Kozalin probably didn’t look any safer to them. At least in Valhalla they wouldn’t have to worry about starving to death.

“Probably,” I agreed as we reached the door. The junior priest who was playing door guard just waved us through.

“I wonder how they match up the widows with their husbands?” I mused as we passed through. “That could be tricky, especially if you have a lot of women who don’t really have anyone waiting for them.”

“Still prying into the affairs of the gods, after all this time? Some men never learn.”

The stranger’s voice was cold and grim, overflowing with an implacable determination. I turned my attention from the hopeful widows, and found myself facing an old man with a grey beard, and a patch of aging leather covering one eye. In one hand he held a long spear tipped with a jagged point of something my earth sorcery said wasn’t metal, and there were a pair of ravens perched on his shoulders.

“Odin?!” I gasped, and took an involuntary step back. I ran into a wall of muscle, and an enormous hand came down to grip my shoulder.

“None of that, little wizard. Father wants a word with you,” a deep voice rumbled from somewhere above and behind me.

I glanced back to find a towering mountain of muscle with a shaggy red beard, and a massive hammer in his hand.

Odin’s dry chuckle pulled my attention back to him.

“We aren’t here to kill you, Daniel. Asgard never joined the Exterminatus, if you’ll recall. I judge that if you’ve lasted since the fall of Atlantis without overturning the natural order, you aren’t going to start now. Besides, Brand has been singing your praises since he returned to Asgard. I understand we have you to thank for that?”

I took a deep breath, and tried to make my hands stop shaking. Gods. Two of them. Probably the worst pair imaginable, at that. Thor could smash any defense I could raise, and Odin probably knew more about magic than all the wizards in Europe put together.

He was also waiting for an answer.

“Possibly,” I temporized. “I’m sure he had a contingency of his own, and it might have worked. But I’m trying to keep word of that operation from getting back to the wrong ears.”

There were more people here than just the two of them. Archpriest Edvin was hovering near Odin, ready to carry out any orders he might give. Behind them four huge men who could have been Brand’s brothers stood guard around a rainbow haze that was filled with intense magics I didn’t immediately recognize. Behind me a couple of priests were ushering the steady trickle of women off to a disk of rainbow light that had to be the Door of Devotion, and incidentally keeping them from bothering the gods. The portal and the exit were each guarded by a couple of men in temple livery.

A faint smirk touched Odin’s lips. “An Atlantean wizard who understands discretion? Maybe an old dog can learn new tricks. Come along, then, and we shall speak beyond the reach of prying ears. I have need of your services.”

Chapter 8

They didn’t bother waiting for an answer. In moments I found myself following Odin into the mist of rainbow colors, with Thor still crowding me from behind. Their guards, who I guessed must be demigods, fell in behind him as we passed.

Then the temple sanctuary faded away, and I was standing on a rainbow that stretched across an abyss of primal chaos. Just looking at the confused jumble of color made my brain hurt, but it was also familiar. It was the same place Hecate had dragged me through when she brought me to this world.

Odin followed my gaze. “Considering a swim, Daniel? You’d best have your own tether, then, for I’ll not be fishing you out.”

“Once was enough,” I replied.

He gave me a knowing look, and set out across the rainbow bridge. I took the opportunity to consult the only advisor I had on hand.

Alanna, how private do you think our connection is?

I was ancient when Odin first emerged into this world, Daniel. While you wear me, both your thoughts and our speech are hidden from all prying ears, Alanna replied. She sounded a bit tense, but not nearly as worried as I was.

That’s good to know. What does he think I am? An Atlantean wizard who survived the fall of their civilization?

All of the survivors were killed for their offenses against the gods, she said. But there are some who bound their souls to a cycle of reincarnation, and keep returning even now. Usually their memories of past lives come back to them in their teenage years, and they begin wielding the lost magics of Atlantis again. He seems to think you are one of those.

Lovely. How would they address a god?

By name, as if they were mortal sovereigns of no great note. The wizards of Atlantis had no reverence for the gods.

“So you’ve bargained for sorcery,” Odin said, interrupting my silent conversation. “But surely not with Hecate. She’d hardly overlook what you’ve done to that witch.”

“Actually, the witch is pretty happy about her situation. Something about saving her from a troll, and feeding her monsters so she can get stronger. I try not to provoke deities, even the ones who are obviously on the losing end of a long war. Dying sucks, and she’s the sort who’d kick down my door some dark night to do the deed personally.”

Thor laughed. “You’d know all about that, wouldn’t you? Which one are you? The one with the demon army, or the guy who likes to turn women into mana fountains?”

“I’m the guy who was smart enough to keep his head down, and try not to draw attention,” I replied. “I guess Ragnarok wasn’t as distracting as I thought it would be. What’s this about, anyway? I haven’t done anything against Asgard, as far as I know.”

“I’d say you’ve done us a service,” Odin said. “Gaea will blame me, of course. I’m sure you were counting on that. But I know what Brand brought to Skogheim, and it wasn’t a curse of invisible death. I don’t suppose you made two of them?”

“No,” I said firmly. “One was risky enough. It isn’t a safe process, and becoming known as someone who can do that wouldn’t be good for my life expectancy either.”

We reached the end of the bridge, and emerged through another misty shimmer into a mustering hall filled with guards. There must have been several hundred troops, all hard-eyed men armed with swords and axes. Odin ignored them completely, setting off across the room as everyone scurried out of his way.

“Yet you were willing to risk it to defend your new citadel?” Odin said as we reached a door. “You should have a care, that your enemies do not discover how important that place is to your plans. Or perhaps it’s your ladies? Growing attached to women is always a risk, when there are so many things that can happen to them.”

I tried not to show any emotion at that, but I doubt I succeeded. He opened the door, and led me into an empty plaza with an odd magical construct in the center. Some kind of magic portal? Probably. It looked like a simple stone arch, but the enchantments on it reminded me of the Dark Portal back in Kozalin.

Actually, part of the pattern looked suspiciously similar to the magic I’d seen when Brand used the Dark Portal to raid Gaea’s realm.

“Don’t tell me you’ve got the Runesage stashed up here somewhere?” I remarked.

Odin scoffed. “As if I’d have that vainglorious snake within my walls? But he did fine work, and you should know I’m not too proud to hire artisans when there’s need. Come.”

Alanna, I seem to recall a story about how the Aesir hired a giant to build Asgard’s walls, and then sent Loki to sabotage his work so they wouldn’t have to pay him.

Alanna snickered. That would be the one where Loki became a mare to lead the giant’s draft horse astray, and then gave birth to Sleipnir some months later?

So that really happened?

Oh, yes. Loki was the laughingstock of Asgard for ages, and even on Olympus the gods made fun of him for it. Although I hear certain goddesses were impressed.

I bet. But I was more interested in the part where they didn’t mind cheating to break a deal.

Daniel, they promised to pay him the sun, the moon and the goddess of womanhood. Three things Odin didn’t even own, and had no power to give. Surely only a fool would have thought he was serious to begin with?

Maybe. But it told me I’d better not expect honest dealing here.

We passed through the portal onto an open plain of barren rock that stretched out for a mile or so in all directions. There was no sign of life anywhere in the expanse of bare stone and sand, but the location clearly wasn’t abandoned. In the distance I could see a high wall that completely enclosed the whole area, and beyond it the tops of a few tall buildings were visible in the distance.

The wall was built in a rather odd style. It was stone, and the top had crenellations like a castle, but there were no towers anywhere. Just a single square gatehouse, guarding a gateway so big I could easily make out the doors even from this distance. That was strangely simplistic, considering that the wall had to be more than a hundred feet tall. Normally when someone gets that ambitious with their fortifications they put more thought into the design.

I didn’t spend much time thinking about the wall, though, because I had something more interesting to grab my attention. Directly before us, maybe a hundred yards away, was the strangest magical construct I’d ever seen.

At first glance it looked like a hexagonal tower of translucent green crystal the size of a modern skyscraper. The top was a jagged mass of broken crystal, and here and there along its flanks there were great rents that exposed the interior. But instead of rooms and hallways, the inside seemed to be mostly full of… machinery?

Silver pipes, and gold wiring. Panels covered with intricate gold traceries that reminded me of circuit boards. Racks of strange crystals radiating complex webs of magic. Here and there a broken crystal emitted periodic bursts of lightning, which crawled across the surrounding circuits like a living thing before fading away. Several of the jagged gaps gave off an eerie blue glow that I knew all too well.

I stopped in my tracks, and tried to conjure a wall of stone between me and the artifact. But nothing happened, aside from an uncomfortable stretching sensation.

“Ah, so stone is the answer?” Odin said. “A useful tidbit, but of course this place is warded. I can’t have that disloyal whelp discovering what I have before I put it to use.”

Alanna, what am I looking at? I asked silently.

The Sunspire! She replied, in an awed tone. I thought it was destroyed. Daniel, this is the artifact that the Atlanteans used to make war on the gods. Every wizard with a connection to it could wield the limitless might of the sun. They used it to lift an entire kingdom from the depths of the sea as a show of power, and when it broke Atlantis sank beneath the waves. But Poseidon told me it was destroyed in a great explosion of fire. He lied to me!

People do that.

“Why am I seeing this?” I asked.

“Isn’t that obvious?” Thor said. “Fix it.”

I gave him an incredulous look. “Just like that?”

“We don’t need it restored to full operation,” Odin said. “Perhaps if I’d found you a hundred years ago. But that’s water under the bridge. Today, this is what matters.”

He drew a long rod of green crystal inset with gold tracery from under his cloak. It was topped with a transparent crystal the size of my fist, and the other end came to a sharp point that he drove into the dirt.

A davdanyak, Alanna supplied. A Devouring Rod. The Atlanteans used them to feed souls to the terrible workings inside the spire. They say even gods could be eaten, if they were caught in a moment of weakness.

“You want to feed Loki and his allies to the Spire,” I said slowly. “Kill them one by one, and use it to keep them from coming back.”

Odin nodded. “I do. But the rod doesn’t work. Your task is to discover why, and repair it.”

“Didn’t I just say that I don’t like making enemies of gods?” I protested. “If I get involved in this I’m painting a huge target on my back.”

Thor crossed his arms over his barrel chest, and scowled down at me. “Too late for that now, little wizard. Battle is looming, and every man must pick a side. You’d best choose wisely.”

Well, fuck. Apparently saying no wasn’t an option here. Not with Thor looming over me, fingering that hammer of his. I wasn’t ready to fight a god.

Yet.

But apparently the men who built this artifact had done it. As I examined the rod, my mana sorcery showed me the enchantments on it as clearly as anything else I’d ever looked at. What secrets could I learn here, with a little study?

“It’s going to take time,” I began.

“Loki’s armies are on the march,” Thor said. “Best work quick, unless you want to be here when they hit our walls.”

“Indeed,” Odin agreed. “One would think he’d refrain until Fenrir is free, and the prophecy can be fulfilled. He must believe that he’s found another way to kill me, and that bodes ill for the coming battle. This is not our only stratagem, but a success here is your surest path to not being slain by some Great Beast in the days to come. Unless you think seducing Loki’s daughter will somehow move him to mercy?”

Right. Brand had seen the way she was treating me, hadn’t he?

“Having her plead my case might. But it’s not something I’d want to count on,” I admitted.

“Then I’ll leave you to your work. Obviously no one will bother you here, since only a god can stand in the presence of the spire without dying. Speak with the guards at the gate if you need materials, or a place to work. You’ll be a guest in Valhalla until you’ve finished your task.”

Guest. Right. More like a fucking slave, asshole.

Thor was watching me carefully now, with one hand on his hammer. Probably just waiting for an excuse.

Instead of arguing, I nodded. “Alright. One thing, though. What am I getting paid for this job?”

Thor laughed, a great booming sound, and patted me on the back hard enough to stagger me. “Paid? The world is ending, and he wants to be paid? Ain’t that just like a wizard!”

Odin studied me carefully. “By all means, a craftsman should receive a suitable fee for his work. For the repair of such a potent weapon, only an item of equal rarity will do. But Asgard has need of every tool of war we can lay our hands upon, so it will have to be something more suited for peace. Hmm. Yes, for a wizard who bears a great love for his ladies, there is only one choice. I will give you Aphrodite.”

My jaw dropped.

“The men will be disappointed,” Thor grumbled.

“The men will be less fractious without her constantly stirring up trouble,” Odin disagreed. “But I’m certain a wizard of Atlantis will have some use for a chained goddess. Now, I’ll key the wards to let your magic through, in case you need to conjure materials. Speak to Gustav if you need anything else, or when you have progress to report.”

He turned, and stepped back through the disk of swirling darkness behind him. Thor followed, and then it vanished.

I turned back to the rod, and the broken tower of magical machinery.

“Fuck.”

That would be the first thing to do with her, Daniel, Alanna said impishly.

I am not getting involved with Aphrodite, I said sternly. Even if I really do this, which is by no means certain. The last thing I need is some sex goddess turning my men against each other for revenge, or charming me into doing something stupid.

Revenge? But Daniel, Aphrodite loves her little games of temptation and violence. Why do you think she gets herself into these situations? She loves to make a man prove he can subdue her.

So she’s a crazy sex goddess? Yeah, that’s so much better. That’s why he wants to unload her on me, isn’t it? She’s a poison pill. No, if I somehow end up with a chained-up Aphrodite on my hands after this I’m going to take her straight to the chapel, and hand her over to Hecate. Maybe they can be allies or something, but I’m not going to try to deal with her myself.

That’s probably wise, Alanna admitted. So what are we going to do?

I considered that for a moment.

If Nomiki tries to talk to you through your tree, will you be able to hear her from here from here?

Yes. I might even be able to get us out that way, if we put some work into it. Asgards wards are strong and devious, but so are we.

No, running away won’t help. Odin knows where we live. If we end up leaving without doing the work, we’ll have to wait until things are bad enough that they don’t have the luxury of chasing us.

Gods have long memories, Daniel, Alanna advised. It would be unwise to rouse Odin’s anger, unless you are certain that Asgard will lose this war.

I know. Say, are you all right? She still sounded rather worried, and I wasn’t used to hearing that from her.

I’m frightened half out of my wits, Daniel. I’m not in the habit of putting myself in real danger, but Asgard is full of beings who might find a way to end my existence if they made the effort. Worse, you’ve no means of survival if some Aesir should decide to kill you. I’ve only just found you, and now I could lose you to the slightest false move.

I reached out through our connection, and gave her a mental hug. She sighed, and returned the gesture.

We’ll get through this, Alanna, I told her. I can be polite to all the murderous gods, and they’re not going to kill me before they’re done with me. All bets are off if I actually do fix this thing for them, but I know better than to just assume they’ll let me walk away afterwards. We’ll just have to come up with a plan that gets me out of here before then, without pissing anyone off too much.

That’s probably the wisest course, Daniel, she conceded. But I don’t mean to be a distraction in a time of peril. Shall I explain the situation to Nomiki, when she eventually comes to ask where we’ve gone?

Yes. Tell her I don’t think we’re in any danger as long as I play along, but it’s going to take some time to find a way out of this situation.

I turned to the rod, and gave the enchantments on it a careful once-over. It was nicked and dented in several places, warping the magic it held. There was one spot where the enchantments themselves had been damaged by some kind of spell breaking effect, and a chip was missing from the big crystal.

Maybe fixing those problems would be enough to get it working again. I probably wouldn’t be that lucky, though. The damage to the rod looked pretty minor, all things considered.

The spire, on the other hand, was in pretty sorry shape.

I left the rod where it was, and walked over to the spire for a closer look. There were no doors or maintenance hatches, nothing intended to serve as a way in. But I could still fly here, so any of the holes would serve as a makeshift entrance.

Well, any hole that wasn’t filled with the ghostly blue glow of Cherenkov radiation. I suppose those parts of the tower were full of water instead of air for some bizarre reason, a detail I wasn’t going to waste time wondering about for now. How intense did the radiation have to be for that glow to be visible in daylight, though? Bad enough that my healing amulet was drawing a detectable amount of power, even at this distance. Without it I’d already be dead.

How are you feeling? I asked Alanna.

A bit strange, now that you mention it. Should I be healing myself?

Yes. You’ll need to draw on my sorcery for that. Normal healing magic doesn’t work on radiation damage. You should banish that layer of steel as soon as we get outside the wards, too. If whatever this thing puts out is hard enough to penetrate a layer of steel, it’s probably going to induce secondary radiation too.

I’m afraid I didn’t follow that, Daniel.

Those blue lights are a sign of an invisible energy that kills anything it touches, I explained. Normally it shines out from the source, like light from a fire. But it can also sink into things, and then slowly leak back out poisoning everything in the area.

I see. Then I am lucky to have a wizard who understands such matters, for I never would have guessed. Is this some hidden defense, to keep outsiders from learning the secrets of the spire?

No, I told her. Crazy as this may sound I’m pretty sure it’s an accident. Certain kinds of magic naturally tend to produce radiation, especially when the enchantments are damaged. Although it’s interesting to learn that the Atlanteans knew something about nuclear physics.

Atlantis was born from Man’s dream of gaining power through knowledge, Alanna said. I would not be surprised at any hidden lore they might have possessed.

I frowned. What do you mean, born from a dream?

You did not think such a legendary place arose by the same means as ordinary nations, did you? Atlantis was a dream made real, brought into the world at the very dawn of Man’s journey into wisdom. It was the greatest working of the dream shamans, when their art was at its height. Before Man’s dreams were broken, filled with nightmares of failure and disaster.

I thought I’d understood why Hecate had sent the groves my way, but suddenly I suspected a whole new dimension to her schemes. How many people were there who knew things like that, even in the vaguest terms? And Alanna had been there to see it happen.

You and I are going to have a long conversation about that sometime soon, I said. But first, I’d better take care of some more immediate issues.

The rod didn’t seem to have any spells running that would affect someone just by touching it. So I pulled it out of the soil, and took it with me as I lifted into the air. It was a long walk to the wall, and I didn’t intend to spend that much time in this poisonous environment.

Flying over the wall didn’t seem like a smart idea, though. A place like this must have ways to deal with flying enemies, and I didn’t want to find out what they were the hard way. So I set down in front of the gatehouse, and looked for a way to get someone’s attention.

The main gates were thirty feet wide and probably twice that tall, covered with big plates of iron riveted to some internal framework I couldn’t see. There were no sentries visible atop the wall, either. But there was a postern gate, a heavy iron door of normal size set into one of the leaves of the main gate.

I strode up to it, gathered a little force magic in my hand, and rapped my gauntlet against it with the strength of a troll. Each contact made a thunderous booming sound, and I was amused to note that my knuckles made tiny dents in the surface of the door.

A metal cover slid aside, and a pair of wild eyes peered out through a vision slit. “What? There’s someone in the wasteland? Who’s there?”             

“I’m Daniel the Black,” I declared. “Odin brought me here to complete a task of wizardry, and he told me to come here for assistance.”

“Who? What? I didn’t hear anything about this.”

“It’s a long way to Odin’s hall, and I’ve only been here for a few minutes. The messenger probably hasn’t gotten here yet,” I guessed. “Open the door.”

“Open the door? To some stranger from the cursed waste? I think not!”

I rolled my eyes. “Open the door, or I’ll open it myself. The Allfather will forgive me for wrecking a door or two, but then you’ll have to deal with the curse billowing out through the gap in your wall. Have you seen how it kills men? It’s not an easy death.”

“Hah! No warrior of Valhalla fears death, wizard. We face it every day on the fields of honor. Now hold your horses while I check this out. If your story is true I can find out easily enough.”

The cover slid back over the vision slit, and I could barely make out a rattle of mail as the man moved away.

Stupid warriors should have more respect for my wizard, Alanna grumbled. That door is hardly warded at all. I bet you could bring it down in moments.

Probably. But I think I’ll try a more subtle approach.

I put my hand on the door, and reached out with my force sorcery. Pulling, pushing, feeling which parts moved and which didn’t. Aha. There was the bar. Did it slide? No. Lift? Yes!

I levitated the bar, and pushed the door open. On the other side was a small alcove in the body of the main gate, which turned out to be a couple of feet thick. Oddly enough there was no one there.

Prompted by some contrary impulse, I stepped through and closed the door. A couple of seconds to replace the bar, and I nonchalantly leaned against the inside of the door.

The wall must have been absurdly thick, because the space behind the gate felt more like a tunnel than a room. But again, the design was quite odd. There was another huge set of doors at the far end of the tunnel, but they were barred from this side. Looking up I could see murder holes in the ceiling, but there was also a ladder leading up to a trapdoor.

So, the wall was supposed to stop people from going through in either direction?

I could easily see why Odin would want to keep people away from the Sunspire. Secret weapons are a lot less useful if your enemies know you have them, and there’s no telling what kind of trouble someone could cause by tampering with it. But why the inward-facing defenses? Was he worried about something coming out of the spire?

That was a cheery thought.

I occupied myself for a few minutes wondering about that, until I heard the rattle of mail approaching again. I looked up to find that a couple of burly men in armor were climbing down the ladder. One was the sentry I’d spoken to earlier, while the other was so massively built that I immediately suspected him of being a demigod. You just don’t see a lot of normal men who are seven feet tall and built like a linebacker.

The sentry reached the bottom of the ladder, and did a double take as he saw me leaning casually against the wall of the tunnel.

“Shit! How did you get in here, wizard? I told you to wait outside the damned door!”

I shrugged. “You’re a fool if you think I’m going to spend a minute longer than I have to out there. Is this the duty officer?”

The larger man turned to me, and I notes an obvious family resemblance to Thor. Same red hair, same nose and jaw, same enormous biceps. But Thor had struck me as a little slow-witted, and this guy’s eyes were sharp.

“I’m Gustav Thorson,” he said, offering me his hand. “You must be Daniel.”

“That’s me.”

I took his hand, and found myself having a flashback to my first boss after college when he immediately went for the knuckle-crusher grip. That might have seemed stupid, since I was wearing gauntlets, but he was easily strong enough to crush normal steel. I could feel the strain on Alanna’s reinforcement magic as he tightened his grip.

He snorted. “Typical wizard, always hiding behind your magic. You should try working out sometime. What are you bothering my men for, anyway?”

“The Allfather gave me a job to do,” I said, ignoring the jab. “But it’s going to take some time. I’m going to need a workroom that isn’t in the wasteland, and someplace to sleep. If there’s a place that isn’t warded I can provide my own materials, but otherwise I’ll be bothering you for a bunch of exotic parts too.”

He finally released my hand. “You really think you can fix that cursed thing?”

“It’s a tall order,” I admitted. “But I don’t think he’s expecting a miracle. I just have to get this rod working again.”

I gestured with the rod. Gustav took a step back, eyeing it carefully for a moment before he seemed to realize it was damaged.

“Useless wizard crap. The Allfather is wasting his time on this. Valhalla has the greatest warriors ever to walk the world. When those monsters reach the Golden Fields we’ll water the crops with their blood.”

“Well, if you can convince Odin of that I’ll be happy to head back home to my wives. But until then he’s given me a job to do, and I’m not going to argue with him.”

He grunted, and turned away. “Come on, then. I’ll figure something out. A wizard in Valhalla. What a joke. Can you even use a weapon? Or is it all magic with you?”

“Not melee weapons. I’m a decent marksman with a gun, but you don’t use those here. It’s sort of like a crossbow, only it shoots a lead ball that will punch right through armor. I did some wrestling too, back when I was young. But when you’re a wizard, the smart way to handle melee combat is to blow everything up and get airborne before someone finds a way through your wards.”

Gustav grumbled something about cowardly wizards under his breath.

“I’ll have to find a band that has room to put you up,” he said. “Not the berserkers, though. That would never work. The regular bands are all bursting at the seams after this year’s harvest. Sappers, maybe? No, wait, you’re the one who keeps blowing things up. The last thing we need is you making them worse. Wait, I’ve got it. Arnor’s band. They’ve just lost a third of their number to a split, so they’ll have plenty of room.”

He took off abruptly, marching down the tunnel and through the postern gate at the far end. I followed, and found myself in a plaza paved with marble.

“This way.”

I followed him through the streets of a bustling city that I assumed must be Asgard. It was strangely different from any settlement I’d seen before, on either Earth. Unlike normal cities everything was spotlessly clean, and every building seemed to be the work of a master architect with an unlimited budget. They didn’t go in much for fancy embellishments, and the shops and taverns that lined the streets were still built close together like in a medieval city. But they had big glass windows, and greenery growing everywhere. The strangest thing, though, was the way everything looked like it had just been built yesterday.

Oddly enough, most of the shopkeepers seemed to be elves. They had fair skin and golden hair instead of the darker tones of clan Nethwillin, but aside from coloring the two races seemed to have a lot in common. They had the same long, mobile ears and inhuman grace of motion, and the same deceptively slender build. At first glance they seemed fragile, especially the women. But every one of them was armed with at least a dagger, and I suspected they’d be every bit as deadly as my own allies if put to the test.

There were dwarves, too. I caught a glimpse of one tending bar in a tavern we passed, and another riding a large golem that was hauling a wagon full of beer kegs. But most of the people I saw on the streets were humans. An endless procession of grizzled warriors, often accompanied by scantily clad young women. There were no children or old people, which was hardly a surprise. But there also seemed to be a marked lack of men who weren’t warriors, or of women doing anything other than hanging on some guy’s arm.

I was so busy taking in the scenery that was a few minutes before I realized that it was going by a lot faster than it should. One minute we’d be turning onto a broad avenue lined with trees, and a few steps later we’d be approaching the fountain I’d glimpsed blocks away at the far end. It reminded me of the way distance had warped when I traveled to Skogheim with the dark elves, except that Gustav didn’t seem to be controlling it. It just happened whenever I glanced away from the road for a moment, like that was the nature of this place.

Maybe it was. There must be millions of people living in this city, so it had to be huge. Getting anywhere on foot would take forever without some kind of magic.

After a few minutes we left the shops behind, and began to pass an endless procession of buildings that all looked like some modern film director’s concept of a Viking mead hall. Each building was the size of a small cathedral, with a giant feasting hall at the front and an area that was probably some kind of barracks behind it. Most of the halls had their front doors open, and banners hung from poles overhead. Oddly enough there were very few men visible here, and a lot of unaccompanied women.

I considered asking questions, and thought better of it. I wasn’t sure what Odin would expect an ancient Atlantean wizard to know about Asgard, and I was sure Gustav would be reporting on me. The last thing I wanted to do was make a mistake that led Odin to question the assumptions he’d made about me. If he realized I wasn’t an Atlantean wizard after all, he’d want to know where I came from and how I did the things I did. It was a short path from there to discovering that I was Hecate’s champion, which would probably mean a quick execution.

Finally we came to a hall whose banner was a simple black field with a silver crescent moon. Gustav tromped up the steps, and through the door.

“Roofmistress!” He called. “Attend me!”

I caught a flash of magic as I followed him in. Something a bit like what Avilla did when she stepped into the wall of her kitchen, and appeared by the breakfast bar. Only there was something else wrapped up in there, too.

A tall blonde in a knee-length dress materialized out of thin air, and bowed to Gustav.

“How may I serve you, Exalted One?”

“This man is a guest of Valhalla, wench. He’s a wizard, working on a secret project for the Allfather, so don’t ask him any questions about what he’s doing. He’ll need a workroom, a place to sleep, and not too many distractions. Can the Moon Ghosts provide?”

She bowed again. “Of course, Exalted One.”

“Then I’ll leave him in your hands. I’ll leave word with my men to let you come and go as you need, wizard. Try not to blow up anything important.”

Chapter 9

The Roofmistress showed me to a surprisingly roomy suite in the building behind the mead hall. In addition to the usual bedroom and sitting room it boasted an armory, a private bath and most importantly a large workroom. One wall of the workroom had a row of windows looking out over an enclosed courtyard, and there was a big wooden table with a couple of chairs positioned where the light was brightest. Aside from that it was empty.

“Does this suit your needs, sir wizard?” She asked.

“Yes, this will work. Oh, my name is Daniel Black.”

She ignored my hand, and bowed instead. “I am Velvet, the Roofmistress of Moon Ghost Hall. Is there anything else I can provide for you? Food? Wenches? Tools or materials for your work?”

“Lunch would be good,” I decided. I tested my earth magic, and found that there were no wards obstructing it here. “I’ll be conjuring my own materials. I take it the men are out?”

“The Moon Ghosts fight on the fields of valor today,” she said. “I shall introduce you when they return.”

“Sure. Oh, let me introduce my companion. Alanna, say hi.”

Instead of just sticking her head out of the armor, Alanna flowed off of me and resumed her usual shape. Velvet gaped at the spectacle for a moment before recovering.

“Greetings, Roofmistress. I am Daniel’s familiar, Alanna. I’m sure the warriors will all have questions, so tell them that yes, I’m a dryad, and no, Daniel doesn’t share me. Daniel, the way Gustav introduced you leaves me as your property rather than a guest, so the hall wenches aren’t going to treat me any differently than your clothes unless you tell them to. Will you please ask them to listen to any requests I might make?”

“Um, sure. Velvet, please treat any requests Alanna might make of you the same as if I was asking in person. Is that alright?”

“Certainly, Daniel. Really, you’ve no need for concern, Alanna. Moon Ghost Hall offers excellent hospitality, and the captain is quite tolerant of oddities. Why, we even have warriors who aren’t entirely human.”

“I’m sure we’ll be astounded by your generosity,” Alanna said dryly. “Run along, then. I need a moment alone with my master.”

“Of course. I’ll have a meal sent up shortly.”

Velvet bowed again, and left the room. As soon as she was gone Alanna shut the door, and shuddered.

“Ugh! So creepy! This place is just as bad as the last time I was here.”

“What’s your problem with Velvet?” I asked. “She seemed nice enough.”

“Of course she’s nice. She’s a jungle cat with its claws and teeth pulled out. No, worse. She’s some horrible zombie golem made of mismatched cat parts, enchanted to purr and do cute tricks on command.”

Zombie golems? She’d looked normal enough to me. “What are you talking about, Alanna? Considering where we are I assumed she’s some kind of ghost or spirit, but I didn’t see a binding.”

“Of course not. What this place does is far worse than a mere binding. The women whose souls end up here aren’t incarnated in bodies like the men, Daniel. They all get melted down into this horrible soup of soul parts, and used to make wenches for the halls. Whenever some warrior looks around for a wench, the magic of Valhalla pours out a measure of soul soup carefully seasoned to his taste, and conjures up a body for it.”

“What? That’s disgusting. Why?”

She sat in one of the chairs, and ran her hands through her hair. “Because this is supposed to be a paradise for warriors, not for women. I suppose creating enough souls to satisfy them all would be ruinously expensive in divine magic, but this way Odin likely gains power from the whole arrangement. The soul fragments that are useful for making wanton party girls go into the hall wenches, and the rest become fuel for his sacrificial magics.”

My thoughts went to the line of hopeful women we’d seen back at the temple. “Then what about the Door of Devotion? Are they just feeding those poor women into this soul dicing machine?”

“Probably,” she huffed. “Oh, I’m sure those who are truly devoted to a warrior of Valhalla will appear for him. But he’ll be getting his own idealized image of her, with all the parts he didn’t like cut away and some young lover’s eagerness to please stitched in beside her own. The worst part, though, is that she’ll only be here for as long as her man wants her. If his eye wanders to another and he stops thinking of her, then back into the soup she goes.”

I stared at her in horror. “They just get… recycled?”

She nodded. “Waste not, want not. Hall wenches only last for as long as someone wants them. The hall conjures up new ones whenever they’re needed, and pours them back into the pot when the men are done with them.”

“Do the warriors here know that?”

“Those boneheads?” She scoffed. “Hardly. All they know is that Valhalla provides whatever they want on demand. No doubt they think their gods watch over them, or some such tripe.”

“Who runs this… system?”

“No one. Odin formed Valhalla from a stolen fragment of faerie, Daniel. He shaped its rules to suit his purpose, and then froze it like a fly trapped in amber.”

I took the other chair, and rubbed my face. “This is a lot to take in.”

“If you doubt my words, simply think about what sort of wench you’d like to see deliver your lunch. The hall will provide.”

“Anything?”

“Anything it can make with the ingredients in the soup. I doubt there are any faerie ladies or cat priestesses in there, but I’m sure it could manage a credible imitation of Avilla.”

I’d barely had a moment to think about that prospect before there was a knock at the door. I got up and went to open it.

Twins. A pair of buxom redheads with trays of food, wearing short skirts with scooped necklines that showed off their breasts.

“Your lunch, sir wizard?” One of them said, holding the tray up with one hand so she could brush my arm with her breasts. I stepped back to let her in, and tried to act normal.

“We brought extra in case your familiar wants some,” the other one said. “Do dryads eat human food, Alanna? No one in the kitchen was sure about that.”

Alanna looked from one girl to the other, seeming vaguely amused. “I do,” she said. “I don’t have to eat as much as a human would, but I enjoy the same foods as your warriors. Thank you, Daniel. I hadn’t thought far enough to realize you could make them care about my wellbeing.”

“Just because you’re not technically a guest yourself doesn’t mean we’re going to mistreat you,” the first servant said. “We’re not heartless, you know. Now, just send word if you want anything else. Unless you’d like some special service?” She added suggestively.

“Not right now, girls,” I said. “Thanks for lunch.”

They left in a cloud of smiles and giggles. If I didn’t know better, I’d think they were just a couple of adventurous girls who were intrigued by their visitors. But I was watching carefully as they left, and once they were out in the hall there was a flash of that same magic I’d seen when Velvet appeared.

Had they teleported back to the kitchen? Or was that what it looked like when hall wenches got uncreated?

“You’re right,” I said. “That’s really creepy when you know what’s going on.”

“Isn’t it? I’m just thankful that my tree is still in Midgard. Any woman who dies in this place is liable to be caught up in that.”

I thought about it as I sampled the meal. It wasn’t Avilla’s cooking by any stretch of the imagination, but it was fairly decent. The bread was fresh, and the beer was simply outstanding.

“I’m tempted to look for exploits in the system,” I mused. “If it’s that good at shuffling traits around, it could probably make an elite spy or battle maid who wants to help us. Only, I’d basically be making someone who’s going to die as soon as I leave. That seems like an asshole move to me.”

“It would be a most horrifying fate,” Alanna agreed. “I suggest you refrain, unless our need is truly dire. Or, perhaps, if you intend to take her with us somehow. They’d simply be ghosts in Midgard, but there are methods of dealing with that.”

“Interesting. I guess they don’t realize what’s happening to them?”

“Of course not. Such knowledge is one of the things the great soup pot discards whenever they return to it. Along with selfishness, jealousy, chastity or anything else that might interfere with their duties. We could tell one, but she’d only remember for as long as she stays manifested.”

“Lovely.”

The more I learn about the gods in this world, the harder it gets to cheer for either side. I couldn’t see supporting Loki when his troops were doing their best to depopulate Europe, but Asgard clearly wasn’t much better. They might even be worse, depending on how you look at things.

“I’m surprised he doesn’t do something like that with the warriors, too,” I said.

“He tried it,” Alanna told me. “A few ages ago, when Rome was young and the Dodecatheon held half of Europe, he copied Zeus’ ancient method of blending souls to make holy myrmidons. But he was displeased with the results. He wanted an army of heroes, men of unmatched skill and valor, not mere lumps of brute force and obsessive obedience. The only way to make such heroes is to start with talented men, and give them centuries of real experience.”

“Like Clan Nethwillin,” I observed.

“Exactly. The Aesir and the Vanir contended with one another for thousands of years, ageless elven skill against human ferocity and numbers. In the end neither side was able to overcome the other, and they decided to make peace and unify their pantheons instead. Valhalla is Odin’s attempt to blend the strengths of the two peoples, and raise an army with human numbers and ferocity that fights with elven skill. Although he is cheating a bit.”

“Oh?”

“Of course. In Midgard, a man who trains diligently for twenty years will find himself reaching the limits of his potential, yes? Not so in Valhalla. The magic of this world nourishes warriors, slowly easing the shackles of mortality. Every decade of practice makes them a little better at their art. The axeman grows stronger, and more tireless. The archer’s eyes sharpen, and he can feel how the wind will blow his arrows. The captain grows taller, louder and more inspiring to his men. After a few centuries they can match cold steel against elves in single combat with a good hope of victory, and they never stop improving.”

“I see. Well, that does explain how Odin plans to fight Hel’s army, even though she must outnumber him a hundred to one.”

“Perhaps,” she said noncommittally. “Their practice battles are quite impressive, but that doesn’t mean the stratagem will work when put to the test. Numbers count, and it isn’t just Hel’s shambling corpses they face. All the frost giants in Jotunheim, plus Surtur's fire giants and the Sons of Muspell? That’s a grim alliance to face, even before you add in Gaea’s creatures and half the Great Beasts. I wouldn’t care to stand on that battlefield.”

She hesitated, and suddenly grinned. “It would be quite a sight to watch, though. Perhaps you could work some secret divination magic, to give us a bird’s-eye view of the destruction? Avilla could make snacks for us to enjoy, as we sit and applaud the slaughter.”

I chuckled. “I’ll see what I can do. But in the meantime, I’d better find out what I’m up against here. If we’re lucky maybe the problem Odin wants me to fix will turn out to be in the rod, and I won’t have to deal with the spire.”

“With luck,” she agreed. “May I clothe you again, Daniel? I shall feel better about this fix we’ve found ourselves in if I know I’m guarding you properly.”

“Sure.”

Wearing Alanna’s armor form was oddly intimate. Almost like holding her in my arms, or maybe like being held. Her magic animated the suit, making it light as a feather, but it responded to my intentions as smoothly as my own limbs. The close contact made our familiar bond even stronger, as well.

There, now you may make plans without fear of some god picking at your thoughts, she said through that telepathic connection.

Thank you. Should I really be worried about that?

Few gods have any skill with such arts, she admitted. But some do. I would be shocked if Odin could not at least pick out strong emotions, or thoughts directed at him. Would you like me to show you how to protect yourself?

Yes, that’s definitely going to be high on the agenda. Damn it, I still can’t believe this is happening.

Alanna had been doing a good job of distracting me, but that couldn’t last forever. I sat heavily, and rubbed my forehead. I’d thought I was finally getting a handle on things, and getting myself into a situation where I wouldn’t need to take crazy risks anymore.

Silly me. I’d been sure the gods were too busy with each other to bother with me, but I’d been wrong. Now here I was, shanghaied to Asgard and impressed into Odin’s forces.

I am surprised as well, Alanna said. I never thought the Aesir would do something so outrageous. Daniel, what are we going to do?

I tried to think. Even if I did what Odin wanted, there was no guarantee he’d let me go. He probably had a hundred potential uses for an ‘Atlantean’ wizard, and if threats worked once why not try them again? But escaping from Asgard wouldn’t be easy, and even if I could do it what then? They’d know exactly where to look for me.

First, I need to take a look at this rod, I told her. Before I decide whether I’m going to try to fix this thing for Odin, I have to figure out if it’s even a realistic option.

It certainly wasn’t going to be easy.

The Rod of Devouring was enchanted using completely different techniques than either my own devices, or the examples of conventional wizardry I’d seen. Wizards would normally have to carve runes into an item to enchant it, painstakingly imbuing each symbol with the appropriate magic and linking the whole structure together bit by bit. My own enchantment technique was more a matter of creating a spell with the effect I wanted, and then binding it into an object until it was solidly attached.

The rod, however, was more like a machine than a normal magic item. It was made up of several parts that locked together, including a central core and several sections of protective cover. The core was some silvery metal that was far heavier than steel, covered with an intricate tracery of gold that reminded me of a circuit board. Magic flowed through the traces in complex patterns, emanating from an oddly sponge-like cylinder of darker metal that one end of the core plugged into. The sections of the cover seemed to be made in layers, with its own set of gold tracery protected between two sheets of translucent green crystal. Gemstones were set into the core at various points, and then there was the big crystal at the end. It was a single impossibly huge diamond, polished into a smooth ball instead of being cut into facets like you’d see in modern jewelry.

I’d never seen such complicated magic. I sometimes used computer programming as a metaphor for my own work, but this reminded me more of the circuit design that goes into making computer chips. As mana flowed through the tracery it formed patterns that created spell effects, but there were all sorts of complicated feedback loops and control switches in there. My mana sorcery fed me a steady stream of hints and little insights as I studied it, enough that I was pretty sure I could figure out how it all worked if I wanted to. But most of it was so alien that reverse engineering it was going to be a slow process.

Well, except for the power source. It only took a few minutes of puzzling over that thing before I realized that I was looking at a matter to mana converter, just like my own power stones. That was why it looked so odd. Even sitting unused most of the time, thousands of years of maintaining the enchantments in standby mode had eaten away about twenty percent of the power source’s mass.

No wonder people kept mistaking me for an Atlantean wizard.

There was something odd about the way the power enchantment worked, though. It was a lot more complicated than my own version, and it wasn’t at all obvious why. It had some pretty elaborate safety features, but the business part of the spell was like one of those Rube Goldberg inventions where you have a million unnecessary steps between the start and finish. Each individual step was an example of flawless precision engineering, like a fine mechanical watch. But I could have gotten the same effect with about a hundred times less complexity.

Were the Atlanteans trying to keep people from reverse-engineering their magic? Or had their wizards made some kind of status game out of seeing who could make the most complicated enchantments?

Looking over the rest of the device made me doubt both of those theories. I could identify parts of the magic on the cover sections as structural reinforcements, spell barriers and other defensive enchantments, which probably explained why this thing was in such good condition. But the parts I could understand all looked like sensible designs. They had that same quality of precision engineering, but not the extra complexity.

I looked at the power enchantment again, and frowned.

It was almost like whoever designed it didn’t understand what it was doing. Like they’d build hundreds of completely unrelated power source enchantments into the same device, most of which didn’t actually work. There were whole sections that seemed to be inert, and others that expended an impressive amount of energy doing nothing in particular, as far as I could see.

But maybe that just meant I didn’t understand what it was doing. Considering how impressed everyone was by the Atlanteans, they probably knew more about magic than I did.

Thankfully, it was probably a moot point. That part of the enchantment seemed to be perfectly intact, so the problem was probably somewhere else. There were several complicated links to what was probably the spire, one of which seemed to be damaged. The top third of the rod held what looked like a whole library of offensive and defensive spells that could be channeled through the diamond, but that setup was also damaged in several places.

It would take a few days of careful analysis before I’d feel comfortable trying to change anything. But the damaged sections looked relatively comprehensible. Thanks to my mana sorcery, it probably wouldn’t take more than a week to repair the thing.

Is that the plan, then? Alanna asked. Shall we bow down to the might of Asgard, and deliver unto Odin a weapon that will aid him in destroying his foes?

I’m not too happy about that idea either, I assured her. I’m tempted to sabotage this thing so it blows up in his face when he tries to use it. But Asgard is already looking like the underdog in this fight, and if Loki wins too decisively we may all get eaten by monsters. I’m going to have to think about this.

I glanced out the window, and found that the sun was dropping towards the rooftops.

First, though, I’d better take care of some immediate issues, I said. I need to make a good impression on our hosts, and considering what I’ve seen of this place I think that calls for a few personal alterations.

The last time I’d used flesh magic to enhance myself I’d still been pretty new at it, and I hadn’t wanted to change my appearance too much anyway. But Asgard seemed to follow the old MMO rule that the more important someone is the bigger they are. My natural six foot height might look impressive in Kozalin, where the men seemed to average around four inches shorter than that. But every man I’d seen on the streets of Asgard was built like a linebacker, and I don’t think there was a single one who didn’t tower over me.

Being a wizard was already going to make me an object of suspicion to my hosts, but I could at least avoid the puny weakling trope.

The flesh shaping was a lot easier to control than the last time around. Over the course of maybe half an hour I added three inches to my height, and filled out the rest of my frame in proportion. I wasn’t interested in the burly weightlifter look that seemed standard here, preferring the build of a serious martial artist instead. But I bulked up my arms and chest a little more than I normally would have, just to make sure they’d notice I had some muscle on me.

When I was done my shirt had gone from loose to pretty tight, but I could still fit into it. Alanna ran her hands over my chest appreciatively.

“Very nice,” she purred. “Perhaps you could keep this form when we return home?”

“Oh, do you like big guys?” I asked. Then I noticed that I wasn’t looking as far down to talk to her as I’d expected, and frowned. “Did you get taller too?”

She grinned her big, teeth-baring smile. “I can’t have the men thinking I’m some helpless little hall wench, now can I? Or did you mean to wear me?”

“No, I think coming to dinner in plate armor would send the wrong message.  Wow. You look like some kind of amazon goddess.”

At five foot four Alanna had looked like a cute teenage athlete. With another six inches she looked like she ought to be playing some superheroine in the latest comic book movie. She’d done more than just getting taller, too. She looked stronger than before, and harder. Not bulky like a female weightlifter, but inhumanly sleek and toned.

“Ah, so you like strong women?” She teased.

“Yeah, you could say that. I guess you’re getting the hang of using my flesh sorcery. Or have you always been able to shape your human form?”

“Somewhat, but not like this. My form is a manifestation of how I see myself, and that can be a difficult thing to change. I don’t look too old, do I?”

If she’d claimed to be twenty-one back home, I would have checked her ID. Her face had aged a couple of years, maybe, but no more than that.

“Hardly. Is that something you worry about? It always surprises me how young dryads look, but most of them seem pretty young mentally too.”

She gave me an astonished look. “Why, Daniel, why would a woman ever want to look older than she must? Youth is a great part of beauty, and every woman wishes to be desired.”

A rush of noise from downstairs interrupted me before I could formulate a reply. Voices, and a lot of boots tromping over wooden floors.

“Our hosts have returned,” Alanna said. “Shall we go down and greet them?”

“Sure.”

I found one of the twins from before standing in the hall when I opened the door. She flashed me a smile.

“Oh, good. I was just coming to get you. Ready to meet the captain?”

I was expecting a bunch of Viking warriors, but the crew I found filing into the mead hall shattered those expectations instantly.

Yes, they were a bunch of burly fighting men. A fair number were even blond, although most had black or brown hair. But their equipment was considerably more sophisticated than the chain mail and axes I’d been picturing. Their armor combined quilted gambesons with bracers, breastplates and helmets of dark metal, all covered in turn with loose tunics and cloaks dyed in forest camouflage patterns. The bows they carried were small enough to be handy in confined spaces, but monstrously thick. Heavy-looking war hammers hung from their belts, and quite a few of them carried some sort of short-hafted halberd as well.

There weren’t nearly as many of them as I’d expected, though. Just a couple of dozen men, most of whom looked pretty beaten up. They were in a foul mood, too. They handed off much of their equipment to the crowd of young women who had gathered to greet them, and stomped across the hall to take their places at the table. The women seemed used to this, and rushed to bring out mead and food.

Velvet met the biggest of the men at the head of the table, and bowed. “Welcome home, my captain. Another thankless battle today?”

“That idiot prince led us into another ambush,” the man grumbled. “The battlegroup lost two bands of heavy infantry before he even understood what was happening. Then the snot-nosed brat gets the bright idea of sending us to assault the enemy flank, and doesn’t bother checking the terrain first. We met their cavalry in the middle of an open field, and by the time we fought our way back to the woods their rangers were well placed to harry our retreat.”

Velvet frowned. “Does the new general have some grudge against rangers, my captain? This is the third time in a week.”

“No, he just doesn’t know his ass from a hole in the ground. I don’t care how much Brand favors him, he needs a hundred years in the Halls before he’ll be fit to lead einherjar. He should be learning to use a polearm right now, not leading a battlegroup.”

He set his helmet down on the table, and took his seat. “So who’s that lurking around behind you, anyway? Another new recruit?”

“No, sir. This is Daniel Black, a wizard from Midgard, and his familiar Alanna. Gustav said that he’s in Asgard at the Allfather’s command, and asks the Moon Ghosts to give him hospitality during his stay. Daniel, this is Captain Arnor, commander of the Moon Ghost band and lord of this hall.”

Captain Arnor looked me up and down with a scowl. “A wizard, in Valhalla? Now that’s just insulting. Do you even know how to fight? Or is it all magic mumbo jumbo with you?”

I shrugged. “I’m sure you elite badasses are more skilled than I am with any normal weapon. But I’ve fought dragons and sea serpents hand to hand, and lived to tell the tale. These days I seem to specialize in killing giant monsters.”

“Huh. I suppose that’s tolerable, then. Is that what you’re here for? Setting up some wizardly trap for the Great Beasts?”

“Something like that. I can’t talk about the details, but I can tell you someone’s going to be getting a nasty surprise if I can pull this off.”

“What if you can’t?” One of the men I hadn’t been introduced to put in.

“Then I’ll be monster chow, and the gods will have one more Great Beast to deal with,” I replied.

The man laughed. “Monster chow, eh? Least he’s got the right spirit, boss.”

“Yeah, yeah. Grab a seat, stranger. Lift a few tankards with us, and share some tales of your battles in Midgard. We’ve heard little enough of how the war goes there. I don’t suppose you know Prince Caspar?”

“Is that who you were talking about before?” I said. “Yeah, we’ve been butting heads since I came to Kozalin to set up my citadel. Annoying as hell, not completely incompetent but not half as smart as he thinks he is. When he died in that raid on Gaea’s halls I thought I was finally rid of him. I should have known he’d end up in Valhalla.”

“Did he really save the city from an army of ape men?” Someone asked.

“Hell, no!” I scoffed. “Is that what he’s been telling people? Brand was in command of that battle, but I was in the thick of the action. Here’s how it really went…”

Chapter 10

I spent half the night in the mead hall, sharing tales with the men and listening to theirs in turn. In some ways that was a waste of time, but given how much people seemed to dislike wizards here I wanted to make a good impression. I wasn’t sure how long I’d be stuck in Valhalla, and there were bound to be endless ways they could make life difficult for me if they wanted to.

So I traded war stories for hours, putting away enough mead to make an elephant tipsy in the process. The men were suspicious of me at first, but most of them thawed a bit as the evening wore on. They were more interested in drowning their memories of the day’s defeat than picking fights with a strange wizard, anyway.

Watching the operation of the hall was educational. Each of the men seemed to have a favorite girl or two who attended him personally, flirting shamelessly as they catered to his every whim. But there was also a swirling mass of serving girls who came and went, bringing in platters loaded with food and mead from the kitchen and carrying off empty containers. In that crowd I rarely saw the same face twice, and I suspected they were all just temporary constructs of some sort. An ever-changing menu of willing flesh, being paraded past the men for the benefit of anyone who was looking for a change.

The twin redheads seemed to have attached themselves to me, because whenever I wanted something one of them was there to provide. They were just as flirty as the rest of the serving girls, flashing me inviting looks and brushing their breasts against me at every opportunity. It didn’t affect me as much as it might have, since my coven binding made them off limits.

But I was amused to see them give Alanna the same treatment. She frowned and tried to ignore them at first, but over the course of the evening her resistance gradually crumbled. By sunset they’d gotten pretty blatant, dropping little hugs and kisses and rubbing their breasts against her at every opportunity, and she was blushing and returning the attention.

I guess even wise, ancient dryads don’t have much resistance to flirtation.

That was when the great table suddenly became much more crowded. One by one the warriors who had died during the day’s battle trooped into the hall, their injuries fading away as they handed off their weapons to the attendants and found their seats. They were in a bad mood, and there was a lot of grumbling about Prince Caspar’s supposed incompetence. Their ire was a good thing for me, though, since I’d already established myself as the man’s rival.

“Did he fuck up your city defenses as bad as our field exercises?” Someone asked at one point.

“Constantly!” I agreed. “I came to Kozalin to build a citadel, and set up some magical farms so we don’t all starve to death if Fimbulwinter really lasts for ten years. But I couldn’t go a week without some new crisis coming up that he wanted my help for. You’d think with thirty thousand troops and the strongest group of wizards in Europe he’d be able to handle a few monsters, but I swear the Unraveler almost took the city with just three ships from Hel’s fleet behind her.”

“The Unraveler? You mean Loki’s daughter?” Another man said. “She’s supposed to be a tricky bitch.”

“I’ll say. She infiltrated the Red Conclave pretending to be a mortal sorceress, and no one suspected a thing.”

I still couldn’t believe she’d pulled that off, especially with such an obvious non-disguise. The whole Conclave had been on the lookout for Loki’s daughter, yet somehow no one thought to wonder about the green-eyed redhead with fire sorcery who was just the right age? There had to be some kind of magic at work there.

The mead flowed freely, and it wasn’t long before the drinking songs started. By then a lot of the serving girls were spending more time in someone’s lap getting felt up than they did working, although they seemed to enjoy the attention. A few of the girls played instruments, and the more athletic ones took turns dancing on the tables during some of the songs. Their clothes seemed to spontaneously become scantier as the evening wore on, although they never quite got to the point of flashing the audience.

By then Alanna had migrated to my lap, and was getting pretty amorous herself. So I took my leave, and carried her up to our rooms.

“Did you ever hear from Nomiki?” I asked her as I shut the door.

“Yes, Daniel,” she breathed into my ear, and then nibbled it a bit. “I told her the whole tale. Everyone is worried, of course, but there’s naught to be done about it. Cerise wanted to follow you, but the others convinced her it would be madness for her to try to come here.”

“That’s good,” I said. “I don’t want them doing anything crazy. It would only make things worse.”

She nuzzled my neck. “Mm hmm. I promised Cerise that I’d take good care of you while we’re gone.

I chuckled. “I bet you did. Anything else?”

“Elin is going to research alternate means of communication,” she said. “Perhaps you’ll be able to speak directly, in a week or two.”

“Good for her,” I said. “Hopefully we won’t be her that long, but it pays to be prepared.”

“We shall overcome, my wizard. Now come to bed, and let me banish your worries.”

She did, too.

Thankfully my healing amulet treats alcohol like a poison, and it can fix hangovers as easily as anything else. So I didn’t have to pay much of a price for the night’s partying, and once I pointed out that aspect of her new powers Alanna recovered quickly enough.

After that introduction the Moon Ghosts didn’t bother me much, and for a couple of days I hoped that I’d achieved my goal of getting time to work without interruptions. Which was a good thing, because the enchantments on that rod were by far the most complicated magic I’d ever dealt with.

A normal wizard could have spent years trying to unravel their purpose, and probably would have failed in the end. Even with the fine perception my sorcery granted, I had to take the device apart to make out the enchantments on all the different pieces. But the enchantments on a given component often didn’t make sense in isolation, relying on the influence of other nearby pieces to achieve their real effect. I could only imagine how confusing that would be for a wizard who had only seen the monolithic enchantment style practiced by European mages.

My mana sorcery was happy to parse out what each enchantment did, and when I held up two parts next to each other I could predict their interactions as well. But there were so many of them that it still took days to work through them all.

The combat spells that the rod could project through that diamond were an interesting puzzle, more like Cerise’s style of battle magic than mine. Instead of using magic to project real forms of energy, the rod spun out magical fields that created all sorts of fanciful effects. There was an attack spell that caused nonliving matter to melt away, without damaging living creatures. Another one made a blinding flash that stunned anyone who saw it, leaving them too dazed to do anything for several minutes. Then there was the one that made ropes of crimson energy that to bind a target, wrapping them in layers of enchantment to prevent them from escaping or casting spells.

I found it interesting that the crimson bonds explicitly prevented teleportation, shapeshifting, dematerialization and about a dozen other things in addition to interfering with active spellcasting. Were there targets that could do that sort of thing using innate abilities of some sort? Or was there a way to resist the anti-casting part?

All of the attack spells were pretty sophisticated, and some of them would penetrate my own defenses disturbingly well. The crimson bonds, in particular, were something I didn’t have a good answer to. I took careful note of the gaps, and spent a couple of hours one afternoon upgrading my personal wards to eliminate the worst of the vulnerabilities.

The diamond’s main function, though, was to act as a focus and targeting mechanism for a family of strange intangible spell effects that the rod’s internal components could generate. That group of enchantments was a lot harder to figure out, because they were supposed to manipulate some sort of invisible force or substance that I couldn’t identify. It definitely wasn’t any of the physical forces I knew, and it wasn’t raw mana either. There were some peripheral bits that worked with the same life energy as my healing magic, although I still suspected that was some kind of analogy or mental shortcut rather than a real force.

The rest, though, was meant to manipulate messy lumps of something that was entirely unfamiliar to me. There was one spell for reaching out and extracting one from a target, with a complex mechanism that looked like it was supposed to dig it out of some kind of protective container without damaging it. There was a storage spell that could hold a few dozen lumps, and a bunch of housekeeping enchantments for managing some sort of spillage or energy bleed off from them. A massively overpowered attack spell could be used as a sort of battering ram, to break down barriers that would normally block this sort of energy manipulation. There were also spells for ejecting stored lumps, or implanting them back into a container. That last one was surprisingly fiddly, with hundreds of complex sub-spells that built smaller structures. Some of that looked familiar to my flesh sorcery, which was really odd…

I’m embarrassed to admit that I spent several hours trying to make sense of that mess, before I finally realized I was looking at soul manipulation magic. Once I made that leap, though, it all made sense.

The rod’s primary purpose was ripping souls out of sacrificial victims so they could be fed to the spire. That’s why the attack spells embedded in it were all disabling effects instead of lethal ones. The soul extraction was a little too slow to be practical against an opponent who was trying to resist, but if you stun them and bind them first that’s another story.

Once I figured that out it was obvious enough why it didn’t work. There was a connector between the soul magic core and the spell focus diamond that was badly damaged, leaving the two components isolated from each other. More importantly, the soul conduit that was supposed to connect the rod to the Sunspire had been broken at some point.

That wouldn’t matter much if you were just using it against normal people. But if you wanted to steal a god’s soul, the enchantments on the rod wouldn’t be enough. That soul trap was nowhere near big enough, and I was pretty sure the mana converter didn’t put out enough power either. At least, the rod’s designer didn’t seem to think so. The enchantments included a mechanism for drawing massive amounts of mana from the Sunspire to supercharge all of its attack spells, and the soul trap had an overflow mechanism that was supposed to feed souls down the link.

So if I wanted to fix this thing, I was going to have to venture into the spire and find the mechanism it was supposed to be linked to.

“But do you want to fix it?” Alanna asked.

“What I want is to be back home digging in,” I grumbled. “I had too much work to do even before this mess, and I want nothing to do with that damned spire. Going inside that thing is going to be dangerous, even for me. But I don’t see a lot of options.”

I’d warded my workshop to prevent eavesdropping, but I couldn’t be sure that would actually work against whatever methods Odin might have available. So even if I’d had a brilliant idea for getting out of this I wouldn’t have mentioned it out loud.

Unfortunately this wasn’t the kind of problem I could blow up, and I was drawing a blank on more subtle solutions. I might be able to figure out some way to sneak out of Asgard if I put my mind to it, but what good would that do? Odin knew where I lived, and it wasn’t like I could move the island. I suppose I could flee to China or something, but how could I possibly relocate hundreds of people without being caught?

So far, the best bet I could see was to play for time. Look busy, promise results without delivering anything, and hope Loki makes his move soon. Once the gods started fighting each other in earnest Odin would be too busy to go chasing after me, and hopefully he’d die in the war. I didn’t like depending on luck like that, but maybe an opportunity would come along if I was patient.

I was just starting to consider how to survive a trip into the spire when I was interrupted by a knock at my workroom door. A moment later, one of the twins stuck her head in.

“Lord wizard? There’s a man here to see you. He says he’s from Kozalin?”

Alanna and I exchanged a look of complete confusion.

“How the hell did they send someone here?” I said.

Alanna shrugged. “I suppose we should find out. But let’s be safe about it.”

She stepped into my arms, and flowed into a wooden shell that tightened and sprouted steel skin. A moment later I was wearing her armor form.

The serving girl stared. “That’s really strange to watch, my lord.”

“Disturbing?”

“It looks like fun, actually,” she replied with a smile. “She can still feel you, right? It just confounds the eye, the way she melts from one form to the other. I wonder if the Hall could teach me to do that?”

“Not if you want to stay human,” I said. “Alright, I’m ready. Go ahead and send him in.”

She bowed, and shut the door. After a brief delay it opened again, and a scruffy-looking guy in a quilted gambeson came in. He held a crumpled hat in his hands, and his eyes darted about nervously.

Strange. He looked vaguely familiar, but his clothes definitely came from Valhalla.

“Good day, lord wizard,” he said with a bow. “I, ah, thank you for seeing a little nobody like me, milord.”

The voice, I recognized. He looked ten years younger, and he’d grown a beard since I last saw him, but I’d know that subdued whine anywhere.

“Nat?” I exclaimed. “Nat Legap? I thought you were dead?”

“Well, yes, milord. Can’t rightly say I expected to end up in Valhalla, of all places. But I’d hardly be here if I still drew breath, now would I?”

Alanna snickered in my ear.

“Oh. Right. I guess this is the Viking afterlife, isn’t it? But, ah, no offense, but I wouldn’t have expected to see you here either. How did that happen?”

A sheepish look stole over his face. “Heh. Might be my Valkyrie ain’t exactly the sharpest tool in the shed, milord. She watched the whole fight with that damned overgrown worm, and she was right desperate to grab someone. But you lived, and that wolf feller died with a prayer to the Witch Goddess on his lips, so she couldn’t rightly take him. I suppose she saw me shaking my fist at the bastard, and decided to settle for that.”

“That’s all it took?”

“I might of shouted something about stepping on him. Hell, what was he going to do to me? I was already dead by then, drowned in that fucking steel coffin. Great idea there, driving down a frozen river in a big metal box. I’m surprised it didn’t fall through before that bastard smashed up the ice.”

“It wasn’t my brightest idea,” I admitted. “Although I doubt using a boat would have worked out any better. Narfing would have just smashed it with his tail when he saw that it was floating.”

“True enough,” he agreed, shaking his head. “I still can’t believe you fought that thing underwater, and came out alive. But I’ve heard all manner of crazy tales about what the city’s been through since then. I don’t suppose you know what became of Aina?”

“Your wife? Yes, as a matter of fact I ran into her just last week. When things got crazy she took the kids, and went to hide out with some relatives of hers in the Fishermen’s Alliance.”

“Them cousins of hers ain’t the most reliable sort,” he said dubiously. “I figured they’d all be frozen by now.”

“Apparently someone got them all pulling together. I was down at their end of the docks doing some construction, and the fishermen had all pooled their efforts to build shelters and stand guard. I’m sure it wasn’t easy, but that’s over now. I built a big keep to defend that end of the docks, and moved them all into it. The Fishermen’s Alliance is going to run a militia to defend the place, and I put Aina in charge of the bathhouse.”

“You did? Well, that’s right kind of you, lord wizard. So she’s safe, then? And the kids?”

“As safe as anyone can hope for, these days,” I agreed. “The keep has stout walls and a strong gate, and the bathhouse is inside the building, so they don’t ever have to go outdoors if they don’t want to. There’s an enchantment that keeps the whole place warm, too, and we’re making good progress on the food problem. The city siege stores are good for a few more months, and we’ve got merchants coming up from the south to sell us their grain now.”

“Well, that’s a load off my mind, lord wizard. They say the gods are letting women into Valhalla now, but she can’t rightly leave the kids.”

“I wouldn’t advise that in any case,” I told him. “Valhalla wasn’t meant for men’s wives, Nat. It does things to them. I shouldn’t say too much, but if it were me I’d keep my girls as far away as I could.”

He sighed. “I thought it sounded too good to be true. Well, it ain’t like I’m suffering, what with the hall wenches and all. I suppose I should get to the reason I’m here, though.”

“Oh? It wasn’t to ask about your wife?”

“That’s personal. This is business. I ended up over in Othar’s Marauders, with a bunch of other guys from Kozalin, and we’re in Prince Caspar’s battlegroup. He heard the stories about a wizard over here, and sent me to see if it was really you.”

“Oh. Joy. What does Prince Caspar want with me?”

“I wouldn’t know, lord wizard. But he seems all keen to talk with you, if it’s really you. Maybe he wants to hear about how things turned out with them ape men?”

“He saw our last battle with the andregi, Nat. They stopped coming after we broke that last army of theirs.”

“Guess it must be something else then. But like I said, he’s all anxious to meet with you, and he’s the battlegroup commander. Kind of a step down for a prince, I suppose, but he still has plenty of weight to throw around.”

“I suppose I’ll have to talk to him,” I conceded. “I don’t take orders from him, but I’m sure he could cause trouble for the Moon Ghosts. What exactly is a battlegroup commander, anyway?”

“Oh, uh, I guess they didn’t give you the lecture, you being a guest and all. Every hall in Valhalla has a war band, with a captain leading it, but those don’t get bigger than maybe a couple hundred men. When a captain’s been here a good while and starts getting a rep they promote him to great captain, and give him a throng of four war bands to lead.

“But that’s the biggest group that sticks together permanent-like. When a great captain gets promoted to commander he gets to pick out throngs to make a battle group, but those come in all different sizes depending on what they’re for. A little raiding group might just have two or three throngs, but a big assault group could have a dozen.”

“I see,” I said. “So basically a band is a company, a throng is a battalion and a battlegroup is a regiment, or maybe a light brigade if it’s a big one. What about bigger forces?”

“The generals are all sons and grandsons of the gods, they say. They each get an army, but they come in different sizes too. They start them out with just a couple of battlegroups, and then they have to win practice battles to earn more.”

Right, so an army could be anything from a brigade to a corps or more, depending on the seniority of its leader. I guess it was a workable system, even if it was kind of disorganized. Or maybe that was just an illusion. If these guys really fought practice battles every few days they had a lot more experience than any normal army would accumulate, so they probably knew what they were doing.

“So how did the prince jump straight to being a commander?” I asked.

Nat shrugged. “It’s Ragnarok, lord wizard. Them Valkyries is working overtime collecting the fallen, and they gotta hustle to find places to put them all. There’s enough dead just from Kozalin to make up most of a battlegroup, so I guess they figured they might as well put them under someone they’re used to.”

“I guess that makes as much sense as anything,” I conceded.

“That, or he bribed someone,” Nat said. “Can’t imagine how, but he is a prince. Brand seems to like him, anyway.”

“Yeah, that sounds like the way these things go. It’s always who you know, not what you can do. Well, where does Prince Caspar want to meet?”

Nat scratched his scruffy beard. “There’s this club in town where some of the officers like to stay in between battles. He has a table there where he has all his meetings.”

Chapter 11

To my ears the phrase ‘officer’s club’ conjures up images of a stuffy, vaguely British establishment where gentlemen in uniforms can enjoy fine dining, play card games and discuss the art of war over tea.

The Slick Vixen was more like a strip club.

A team of four burly dwarves guarded the door. With their coppery skin, jet black beards and prominent tusks they looked like demons, an impression that their equipment did nothing to dispel. The plate armor they all wore was covered with wicked-looking spikes, and they were armed with steel quarterstaffs that had a starburst of spikes mounted on each end.

“Six pennies,” one of them barked as I approached, holding out his calloused hand.

Fortunately Nat had warned me there was a cover charge, so I’d already exchanged some of the gold in my pocket for local currency. I handed over the silver coins, and pushed through the door into a room that echoed with the sound of drums.

The room was dominated by a tall stage, where a blonde elf with the body of an angel gyrated to the smoky beat in a dance that was half Arab belly dancer, and half modern stripper. Her breasts were already bare to the warm air, glistening with sweat, pink nipples bobbing as she swayed to the beat. She was playing with her tiny skirt now, shifting it up and down to tease the audience with what they couldn’t quite see.

I tore my eyes away, and took in the rest of the room. There was a group of male elves in one corner that I realized after a moment was the band, pounding away on their instruments. A bar ran along one side of the room, with racks of bottles and a long row of kegs mounted on the wall behind it, and a mean-looking dwarven bartender who was busy filling a set of huge mugs with beer. The rest of the room was dimly lit, but I could make out booths along the walls and a crowd of cheering patrons clustered around the stage.

A fresh-faced elf girl with golden-blonde hair stepped up to me. “Welcome to the Slick Vixen, sir. Is this your first time with us?”

She looked maybe sixteen, and her outfit was like a sexy parody of a school uniform. Superficially classy, but the skirt barely came to mid-thigh and the top was cut tight to show off the curve of her breasts. Her heart-shaped face was simply beautiful, like every elf I’d seen here.

“Yeah, I’m supposed to be meeting Commander Caspar,” I told her.

She flashed me a dazzling smile. “Of course, sir. He’s in the dining room. Right this way.”

She spun, momentarily lifting her skirt enough to reveal a glimpse of the filmy bit of nothing she was wearing underneath, and led me into the club with a saucy sway in her hips. The motion drew my eyes down miles of shapely stocking-clad legs, and I realized she was wearing high heels. It figures that elves would invent something like that.

We came to a door on the far side of the room, and she turned and caught me looking. Her smile brightened, and she went up on tiptoes to whisper in my ear.

“Want me to pencil you in for some time after your meeting, sir? I’m on the menu, just twelve pennies an hour. But for you, I’ll make it ten.”

She slipped a metal token into my hand and opened the door, not waiting for a reply.

I tried to look composed, but I couldn’t hide my shock from Alanna. Her giggle sounded in my mind.

Didn’t expect that, did you Daniel? Vanir women used to guard their treasures more diligently, but it seems they’ve become completely shameless since I was last here.

I pulled my eyes away from the server’s backside, and glanced around the room instead. How old is she?

Sixty or so would be my guess, Alanna said. Thinking of giving her a try?

I’m married, remember? I pointed out. She’s not a servant or retainer of the coven, so she’s off limits. Besides, I don’t need to pay for sex.

I thought about that for a second, and frowned. Wait a minute. No one in Valhalla needs to pay for sex, so how does she get customers?

Ah, but the hall wenches aren’t elves. Vanir women are a rare treat in bed, Daniel. That elvish tradition of supreme skill applies to bedroom arts as well as war, and their women take great pride in their ability to drive a man mad with desire. I’m sure bedding an elf would bolster any man’s ego, especially if she’s making an effort to please.

I guess that explains it, I mused. But we’re here now, so you’d better let me concentrate.

The dining room was a little closer to my expectations. There were a dozen or so large tables distributed about an L-shaped space that left plenty of room between them, and the sound of the music next door was muffled pretty well. Less than half the tables were occupied, mostly by groups of burly men in blue uniforms.

I hadn’t realized Asgard’s forces even had uniforms until Nat had mentioned it. Apparently only officers and their personal staff wore them, while the fighting men went around in the same gambesons they’d wear under their armor when they went into battle. No one wore full armor unless they were expecting a fight, so I’d been forced to find a tailor and buy some normal clothes for this meeting.

Good thing the shops were mostly run by Vanir, who used magic to assist their crafting work. I wasn’t as stupidly huge as their typical customer, and my tastes didn’t run so much to fur and leather. But it took them less than an hour to throw together an acceptable outfit, with good boots, sturdy pants and a loose-fitting shirt that left room for Alanna to work a few tricks. She’d insisted that it was too dangerous for me to go anywhere in Asgard unprotected, so she was currently in the form of a snug wooden vest hidden under my shirt.

I was a little worried that her presence might show through the shirt, so I’d added a long coat like the one I’d taken to wearing back in Kozalin to the ensemble. This one might not have any protective enchantments, but I still liked the way it looked.

That sort of thing was too plebeian for Prince Caspar, though. He was sitting at the head of one of the tables with a glass of wine to hand, and as I walked up I saw that he’d done his best to recreate the courtly dress he’d worn in life. His ‘uniform’ had been modified with enough gold buttons, braid and gratuitous embroidery to satisfy a French monarch. His companions were a pair of men who must have been long-time veterans of Valhalla, judging from their size.

“Commander, your guest has arrived,” the serving girl said sweetly.

Caspar frowned, and raised his eyes to give me a cold look.

“It’s really you,” he said after a moment. “Lovely. Pull up a chair, wizard. We have things to discuss.”

What an auspicious beginning. He was playing his usual power games, too. The table was too long for me to sit at the opposite end and still talk comfortably, but taking a spot on one side while he occupied the end would be conceding the position of authority he was trying to claim.

Well, two can play that kind of game. I pulled out two chairs, turned one sideways, and filled it in an insolent sprawl while using the other as a footrest.

“Yeah, it’s just great to see you too, former prince. I hope you at least took a lot of the ape men with you.”

He scowled. “More than enough, Daniel. They won’t be troubling Kozalin again, which is more than your magic ever accomplished. Now are we going to trade insults all day, or can we have a civilized discussion?”

“We can talk,” I conceded. “Though I don’t see what there is to discuss. I’m not dead, and I’m only here until I finish this project for the Allfather.”

He raised his hand. “Wench! A drink for my… associate, here.”

Another stunning young elf appeared at my elbow. “Yes, commander. Wine, sir?”

“When you’ve got a dwarf at the bar and a row of kegs marked with runes behind it? No, I’ll go with a beer. Something dark and heavy.”

“Ostenbrew is as far as the einherjar usually go, but we have Black Gold if you want a real dwarven beer.”

“Sounds great.”

She hurried away, and it took me a moment to realize I was watching her go. Damn, that was a fine ass.

I turned back to Caspar, and shook my head. “War may be hell, but at least the gods have good taste in women.”

The guy to his left chuckled. “That’s for sure.”

“Asgard is full of surprises,” Caspar said. “As I’m sure you’re aware, since you’re apparently working on one of them. Although one wonders what use Odin could have for a mortal wizard’s magic.”

I shrugged. “What use would he have for a mortal warrior’s spear? There are only so many hours in a day, and he can’t do everything himself. But the whole thing is a secret, so I can’t tell you any details. All I can say is someone on the wrong side of this thing has a really nasty surprise coming.”

“The more of them the better,” he replied. “I hear there haven’t been any further attacks on Kozalin?”

“No, things have been quiet since we wiped out their last army. Good thing, since no one can agree on who’s in charge with you and Brand both gone. The dukes are busy scheming against each other, the Red Conclave has sealed their gates and your father is busy with his own problems.”

The server set a tankard full of dark, foamy liquid down in front of me. Ugh, right, European traditions. Of course they’d serve beer warm here. But my first tentative sip confirmed that the dwarves knew their beer. This was better than any microbrew I’d ever tried, let alone the mass-market brands.

“And you’ve just been peacefully biding your time?” Caspar said.

“Of course not. I’ve been fortifying the docks, and trying to lure the merchants into keeping our supply lines open. What about you? You got promoted pretty quick for a guy who just got here.”

His grimace told me that was a more sensitive subject than I’d expected. “Brand was persuasive. He made a long speech about our glorious assault on Gaea’s realm, and insisted that bravery should be rewarded.”

“It’s good to have connections,” I observed. “That sounds like it should be routine for you, though, so what’s with the long face?”

“That would bring us to my reason for speaking with you,” he said. “If you’ll give us a few minutes, men?”

The two guys who’d been sitting with him shrugged, and got up.

“I supposed I could check out the stage,” one of them said. “Been thinking about putting up a bid.”

“I’ll stick with the young ones,” the other man said. “Them dancers are a little too money-hungry for my taste.”

“The money’s just how they keep score,” the first one said, shaking his head. “By the time they start dancing they’re all hooked on the big D.”

They ambled off, shamelessly arguing the merits of precocious young girls vs. veteran sluts. I watched them go for a moment, and shook my head.

“This place is so weird. Are all the men here like that?”

“More or less,” Caspar replied with a look of distaste. “Granted, chaste women don’t seem to get called to Valhalla. But good taste is in equally short supply.”

“Huh. So what is it you want from me?”

“A victory,” he said simply.

“You mean in the practice battles? What, are you having trouble beating these meatheads?”

I could almost hear his teeth grind.

“Brand talked me up so much they put me in a veteran army,” he explained. “My opponents have all spent hundreds of years fighting back and forth over the same terrain, with the same bands of warriors. I’d like to see you try to match wits with an opponent who has that sort of advantage.”

“Ah, well, I’m a wizard, not a general. I’d just blow up the enemy army myself.”

“Exactly.”

Suddenly, I saw where this was going. “Wait, I’m not an einherjar.”

“You’re a guest of the Moon Ghost band. They can invite you to do battle with them if they wish. That’s simple hospitality in Valhalla.”

“Caspar, I have my own problems to deal with. I don’t have time to bail your fat out of the fire.”

“It would only take a day,” he pressed. “Just one victory, to keep my standing at three stars until I get my feet under me. We won’t be doing practice battles for much longer, anyway.”

“They rate commanders with stars here? How precious. I told you, I don’t have time.”

“You know, Daniel, there are much more time-consuming tasks that you could be called on to perform. Just imagine, for instance, if someone were to explain the effectiveness of your mortars to the council of generals. Brand doesn’t seem to have described them in any great detail, but I’m sure he’d rectify that oversight if someone were to ask. No doubt they’d want a demonstration of the weapon that broke the andregi army twice, and we both know what would happen after that.”

I scowled at him. “They’d want me to make them some.”

“Don’t sell yourself short, Daniel. We both know you could make enough mortars to equip the entire host of Asgard if you wanted to. But how long would that take, hmm? Weeks? Months? Would you ever truly be finished?”

Now I was the one grinding my teeth. “One battle.”

He inclined his head. “A single victory. With minimum force, even. I’m sure you don’t want to draw too much attention, or have the Moon Ghosts pestering you for a repeat performance. The battle will be in three days.”

“Fine,” I growled. “Then we’re done here.”

I pushed away from the table, and stalked away. Of all the stupid problems I could have run into, why this one? I thought I was rid of that smarmy bastard when he died. But no, apparently even that wasn’t enough to get the job done.

I could still see his hands on Avilla’s body, her face twisted in unnatural ecstasy.

Yeah, it hadn’t been his fault. I didn’t care. Every time I saw him I wanted to punch him in the face.

I pushed through the crowd around the stage, and stepped out of the club still lost in my thoughts. I really wanted to break something right now. Maybe I’d fly out to the wasteland around the Sunspire-

A lance of agony in my side interrupted my thoughts.

Assassin! Alanna’s voice sounded in my mind, just a moment too late. A weedy little guy with dusky skin was stepping away from me, and pulling another dagger out. The first one was buried in my kidney, gushing poison and death magic into my blood.

I staggered, reflexively throwing up a force barrier while I groped for the dagger’s hilt. But he just stepped through it, the magic sliding off like it couldn’t get a grip on him. I tried to fend him off with my free hand, and got a long cut down my arm for my trouble.

Then the dagger was out, and Alanna’s wooden form grew out to cover my whole torso. My amulet went to work trying to heal the wound, fighting with the death magic that wanted to snuff out my life. The blinding pain dropped to a more bearable level thanks to the pain block I’d integrated into the healing enchantment, and I could think again.

So this guy was protected from magic? Fine, how about physical force?

He stabbed me in the shoulder while I was getting my gun out, but this time the dagger just slid harmlessly across hard wood. His eyes narrowed, and he tossed a handful of something at my feet.

That was my cue to take flight. A column of light and flame erupted from the ground, blinding in intensity, and burned off my left leg from the knee down. But the rest of me was already outside the area of effect by then, and I finally had my gun lined up on him.

He started dodging frantically before I even pulled the trigger. I held it down and kept the weapon pointed at him as it kept firing, figuring I’d get a hit soon enough. The big iron bullets smashed into the street all around him, shattering the yellow brickwork. The pedestrians around us shouted in alarm, pulling back and drawing weapons.

No one screamed. It was just a momentary thought, but it struck me just how odd that was. In any other city I’d ever visited, helpless civilians would be screaming by now. But there weren’t any helpless civilians here. The elves who’d been nearby had cleared out with preternatural speed, although I caught glimpses of bows and slender blades appearing from behind cover all up and down the street. The dwarves just hunkered down against the nearest wall and let us pass, half of them pulling out hidden weapons of one sort or another. As for the humans, the einherjar had no fear of death. They just stopped and watched the excitement, as if we were a couple of street performers putting on a show.

The assassin threw a handful of knives at me, magical things that swerved to stay on course as I tried to dodge them. But Alanna had me completely covered in wooden armor now, and was starting to coat herself in steel. So I wasn’t too worried about knives, and kept most of my focus on my shooting.

I winged him with my next shot, and then the knives reached me. My flight was fast enough that two of them missed despite their magic, just grazing the edge of my force field. But the third one struck my chest, and set off a dispelling that momentarily blew away all the magic I had active. A banishment and some kind of poison attack hit me a split-second later, but neither made any impression on the steel breastplate Alanna had conjured.

My flight spell was gone, though, and my ring wasn’t smart enough to recreated it automatically. It took me a moment to realize I needed to turn it off and back on, and I smashed into the street before it could finish cycling. I was going about forty at the time, so there was a lot of tumbling and cursing involved before I fetched up against a stone wall.

Then I found out that the other two knives were still homing in on me when they caught up, and slammed into my back. One of them turned into a plasma bolt that blew my force field down again, and would have cooked me for sure without Alanna’s protection. The other unleashed a ball of acid that ate into everything it touched with a furious hissing sound.

I threw myself away, and conjured a torrent of water to wash myself clean. But when the water touched the caustic goop that coated me it exploded. I flew through the air, momentarily dazed, and landed on a rooftop.

At least the blast had blown most off the goop. But it was still eating my face, and there were little bits of something sticky burning furiously all over my armor. Something that burned hot enough to melt steel, albeit only in small amounts. I’d never been so glad for that pain block.

“Ow.”

Ow, indeed, Alanna agreed. I fear I may need your help, Daniel. I can shed my metal skin and grow a new one easily enough. But the poison from that dagger is most insidious, and I can’t quite seem to heal myself.

“How did you get poisoned? Don’t tell me that dagger actually cut you?”

It did, she admitted. It bore the Nine Trials of Set, an enchantment most inimical to all living things. I knew I should have kept my shell of cold steel intact.

I turned my attention inward, and saw the curses that were trying to kill us both. My amulet was slowing it down, but every time it healed those tainted wounds the curse just killed the flesh there again. Hell, flesh magic alone wasn’t going to be enough. I’d need to call on my mana sorcery as well, to figure out how this curse worked and then pick it apart.

Alanna was too strong to die easily, though, and my amulet would buy me some time. I just needed to make sure whoever that was didn’t try again while I was focused on healing. Where could we hide out? Not the club, that’s for sure. Moon Ghost Hall might be safe, but maybe not.

No, I needed a spot where no assassin would dare to tread.

Hang on, Alanna. I can break the curse, I just need to get us somewhere safe first.

I took off again, rising high into the air on a ballistic arc. In a couple of heartbeats I was pushing the sound barrier, leaving the assassin far behind.

What place would be safe from the Lightbringers? She asked, her voice pained. I had not thought their reach would extend to Asgard. But if they are here at all, they will have their usual network of agents and informants in place.

What the hell is a Lightbringer? And why would they be after us?

She was silent long enough to worry me.

Well, I suppose that proves Odin wrong, she finally said. Although I cannot imagine where you are from, that you have never heard of them. They are the most ancient order of the magi of Egypt, Daniel. They were formed to stand against Atlantis when the City of Dreams seemed poised to depose the gods from their thrones, and they have hunted the survivors of the cataclysm for all the ages since. They see themselves as the defenders of the natural order of the world, and they are backed by the full might of Egypt and its gods.

So, Odin has a leak, I realized. Someone found out that he thinks I’m one of those Atlantean wizards, and passed the word to these Lightbringer guys. How do they think they’re going to stop a bunch of reincarnating wizards, anyway? Don’t tell me they have a way to destroy souls.

No, Daniel. Destroying souls would be a violation of the natural order they revere. They have traps that can capture a soul at the moment of death, to interrupt the cycle of reincarnation. When they catch an Atlantean wizard they take them to the pits of Badai Kudel, where they can lock them in a prison made of nightmares to be punished for the transgressions.

Well, shit. These were some serious assholes. Not to mention tough as hell. That assassin had been as skilled as an elf, and whoever made his gear knew how to fight wizards. This could be a serious problem.

But I had to live through the next hour before I could worry about the long run. I passed over the wall that surrounded the barren wasteland where the Sunspire stood, and picked out a spot to land.

Why are we here? Alanna asked. Are we not hurt badly enough already, without venturing into this cursed place?

That’s why we’re here, I told her. We can survive it, but I’ll bet those ancient magi don’t run into radiation very often. Even if they know a way to deal with it, their agents here aren’t likely to have the right protections.

I set down on an expanse of bare rock, and slumped. The flesh of my face was regenerating almost as fast as the remaining acid ate into it, but my vision was getting blurry. I needed to get this stuff off of us both before it did any more damage, and stop the bleeding from the stump of my leg. Then I could focus on figuring out that curse before it managed to stop my heart, or break Alanna’s connection to her tree.

Maybe if I kept myself busy, I could avoid thinking about how close I’d just come to dying. If not for Alanna I wouldn’t have survived that attack. Even with her help I would have been out of action without the pain block from my amulet, and I had no doubt that assassin would have circled back around to finish us off if he’d gotten the chance. Hell, if I couldn’t fly I don’t think I’d even have made it away. Hopping down the street on one leg certainly wouldn’t have gotten me very far.

I needed to have a long talk with Alanna about who these guys were, and what they could do. Then I had some serious prep work to do, before they took another shot at me.

Chapter 12

Gustav was waiting for me at the gate that led out of the wasteland.

“Not even here for a week, and you’re already causing trouble,” he grumbled, crossing his burly arms and scowling at me. “I’ve been listening to complaints from shopkeepers for the last hour. What happened?”

“Apparently the Lightbringers have a spy in Odin’s hall,” I replied. “One of their assassins tried to take me out in the middle of the street.”

He looked me up and down, and snorted. “Looks like you’re not as tough as you thought, doesn’t it? I’ll have to put a guard on you from now on.”

I’m sure I was a sorry sight. My leg was still missing from just below the knee, and I hadn’t bothered to heal the flesh of my face yet. The rest of me was completely covered by the armor Alanna had become, but the mere fact of its presence made it obvious I was worried about another attack.

Even so, I didn’t have much faith in any guards Gustav might assign me. If these assassins were as good as Alanna thought a squad of einherjar wasn’t going to slow them down much. Maybe it would buy me a couple of days while they planned out a way to deal with the obstacle, but that was the best I could hope for.

“What, do you have a secret anti-assassin squad?” I scoffed. “I don’t think regular troops are going to stop these guys.”

“No, but this way when we find your body I’ll be able to tell Odin I did what I could.”

“Your concern is so touching,” I said.

He smirked. “No use pretending, wizard. You know what I think if your kind. I suppose you’ll be laid up healing for the next month?”

“Just a couple of days,” I lied. “The leg is easy, but the damage the curse did will take some work to fix.”

“I’ll file a report,” he said. “If you’re going to die, try and hold off until we get the betting pool set up. Rolf, take your squad and escort the wizard back to Moon Ghost Hall.”

Ass. I should have just flown back, and left him wondering what was going on.

At least we made it back without incident. I locked myself in my quarters for a couple of hours then, so I could finish healing Alanna and think about what to do.

“They will try to avoid wholesale slaughter, at least at first,” Alanna advised me. “But now that they think you a target they will never give up. They will simply keep coming, using a different plan of attack each time, until they find something that works on you.”

“Well, this is a fine mess Odin has gotten me into. I’m pretty sure they must have heard about me from him, and not from reports of what I’ve been up to in Kozalin. Otherwise they would have been ready for my healing, and the fact that I can fly.”

“Agreed. Flight is rare, but you are not the first wizard to achieve it. I wish we could simply convince them of their error, but they will never believe it now. Not unless you can reveal the truth to them instead.”

The truth was that Hecate had violated some kind of truce between the elder gods of multiple worlds when she recruited me from my Earth. Revealing that would probably cost me her patronage, and who knew what kind of enforcement team a treaty like that might have? I might get the Egyptian magi off my back, only to end up targeted by a bunch of angry gods instead.

“That isn’t an option,” I decided. “No, we’re just going to have to beat them.”

She boggled at that. “Beat them? Daniel, the Lightbringers are the most deadly assassins in the world! The magi that back them have skills even the cultivators of China would be hard-pressed to match, and they operate under Ra’s blessings. They have hunted the survivors of Atlantis since the days when the sphinx was new, and defeated even the mightiest wizards in the end. Can you really hope to withstand them?”

Could I?

I had a lot of raw power, but I’d barely started to delve into the possibilities of my magic. These guys had been perfecting elaborate mage-killing weapons for thousands of years, and testing them against the most dangerous prey in Europe. That was an intimidating prospect even without factoring in the possibility of divine support.

On the other hand, Egypt was a decadent nation ruled by a decrepit old murderer and his pet band of sycophants. I had my own divine backing, and Hecate was a lot more proactive than Ra. I had my own brand of inscrutable magic, born of the terrifying discoveries of the atomic age, and with my mana sorcery I could figure out other people’s secrets with ridiculous speed.

“I think I have a shot at it,” I said. “Egypt is old and fading, and we’re a rising new power. But I can’t do it alone. I’m going to need help, from people like you and our dark elf friends, because I’m going to be playing catch-up for a while here. Are you with me on this? I know a shadow war with the Lightbringers isn’t what you signed up for.”

She studied my face carefully. “I would think this vainglorious boasting, if I did not know you better. But it makes no sense. I have seen the whole history of all the Nine Worlds and beyond, and there has never been a mortal mage who could win this fight. Yet I know well that you are no god, nor yet some otherworldly being of power. I would love to stand with you in triumph, my wizard, but my ancient heart fears that this road leads only to death. Can you show me some sign of hope’s trail?”

I put my hands on her shoulders, and looked into her eyes.

“I can’t reveal the truth right now,” I said. “But I can point out at least three ways we could have a chance. I might be part of some secret group that’s powerful enough to fight these guys. I could be from someplace you don’t know about, either a hidden plane like Skogheim or a place beyond the Nine Worlds, where we have better magic than the Lightbringers. Or hey, I could be from the future.”

“The future? Daniel, time travel is impossible!” She protested.

“How many times have you seen someone confidently make a declaration like that, and then be proven wrong?” I teased. “Anyway, it’s not like they can march an army into Asgard and demand my head. Odin wants his superweapon fixed, and if they cause too much trouble he can send a god over to crack down on them. So they’re going to have to keep things subtle, and work with limited resources. All we have to do right now is stay alive until we figure out a solution to this mess with Odin.”

“True. But afterwards?”

“Getting agents to Kozalin won’t be easy, and we’ve got a whole clan of dark elf ninja guarding the citadel,” I pointed out. “I’m not exactly an easy target. But if things start to look hopeless we can always grab the girls and run off to someplace they can’t follow.”

“And just where would that be?” She demanded. “They know the world ways as well as I.”

“Have you ever been to the moon?” I asked.

“The moon?!” She said incredulously.

“Or maybe Mars,” I went on. “That’s a longer trip, but it might be worth the trouble. Think they could find us there?”

“Impossible man,” she laughed. “You’re serious, aren’t you?”

“Completely,” I said. “It would take me a few weeks to set up, but I could build a ship to take us there. I’d just rather not, because we’d have to abandon most of our people.”

“Mars,” she breathed. “Daniel, I thought I had explored every nook and cranny of the Nine Worlds, and long since run out of wonders to see. I know the planets are worlds, but to travel the sky itself is such an impossible notion I never thought to see it happen. Even the gods have never ventured beyond Luna. Tell me, have you been there? Are there fresh wonders to discover, in that trackless expanse?”

“Enough wonders to last a thousand lifetimes,” I told her. “I’ve never been there, but I’ve seen the images send back by exploration golems. Mars is a world of vast canyons and endless frozen deserts, with the biggest mountains in the solar system. But that’s not the only place we could visit, when the war is over. Can you imagine mountains of ice and rock drifting through the void, or a world with storms bigger than the Earth that rage for hundreds of years? Worlds with dozens of moons, of all sizes and colors, and one that’s circled by a bright ring of dust and snow?”

She grabbed the front of my shirt, and pulled me close. Her bright eyes gazed intently into mine.

“Promise me that we will truly make this journey someday.”

“I promise, Alanna.”

She threw her arms around me, and started to cry. I hugged her, trying to figure out where that came from.

“Alanna?”

“I only wanted an excuse, you great fool. Something to placate my fears, and help me convince myself to do what I already wanted to do. You didn’t have to offer up the price of my soul.”

“Oh? Should I have just made a speech about how badass we are together, and left it at that? I guess we could pretend I didn’t say anything about space travel.”

“Hmpf. It’s too late for that now, my wizard. You’ve purchased yourself one ancient dryad, signed, sealed and delivered. I don’t care if Ra himself appears to challenge us. I am not going to lose you before you make good on your promise.”

Who would have thought an ancient nature spirit would turn out to be a space nut?

Well, I wasn’t going to complain. I hadn’t really thought about it before, but the idea of exploring the solar system in a magic spaceship was pretty cool. Not cool enough to tempt me into abandoning all the people in Kozalin who were counting on me, but if I managed to survive Ragnarok it was definitely going on my to-do list.

Right now, though, I needed to make sure I’d survive the next week. Ambushing me on the street hadn’t worked, and assaulting Moon Ghost Hall single-handed would put the guy I’d fought at a big disadvantage. He’d probably send for reinforcements, but if he was trying to be subtle the obvious thing to try next would be poison.

According to Alanna, sneaking into the hall to poison someone’s food wouldn’t be easy. The hall wenches had an innate sense of who was in the building and whether they belonged there that would be difficult to fool, and there was always a group of them in the kitchen. The way they were absorbed and re-created by the hall would make it hard to get one alone to ply her with sneaky tricks, and the hall’s magic would tend to protect them from mind control anyway.

But these guys were supposed to be really good at what they did, so I wasn’t content to rely on the hall’s innate defenses. For all I knew the Lightbringers had figured out how to bypass them a thousand years ago, just in case they ever had a target here. The locals weren’t going to let me set up wards outside my own rooms, of course, and even if they did I wasn’t exactly an expert on magical security. But there was one thing I could still do to give myself another layer of defense.

With my mana sorcery I could actually see the subtle weave of divination magic that pervaded the hall, constantly watching its occupants to find out what they wanted. It took me a little trial and error  to figure out how to feed it requests, but it wasn’t that different from using a magic item with an intent control interface. Deciding what I wanted took longer.

The twin redheads who showed up at my door when I was done looked the same as before, but their expressions were a lot more guarded. They hesitated at the door for a few moments before Alanna shooed them inside. Then they glided across the sitting room of the guest suite to the chair where I was sitting, and knelt at my feet.

“We’re… a bit confused, master,” one of them said.

“I can understand that,” I told her. “I think I can explain things. But why are you calling me master? I wasn’t expecting that part.”

“I have to,” she insisted. “I have all these strange memories swirling in my head, that don’t make any sense. I don’t know who I really am, where I’m from or how I got here. But the one thing I know for sure is that we belong to you.”

“Something about… balance, maybe?” The other one said uncertainly.

“That fits,” Alanna said. “The hall’s magic would hardly leave such hellions free to indulge their own whims, and you did want loyalty.”

I sighed. “Not like that. But there’s no good way to change it at this point, so we’ll have to work with it. Alright, girls, what else do you know about yourselves?”

“We’re hall wenches in Valhalla,” the first one said. “We’re supposed to tend to the hall, and keep the heroes happy. We’ve been here a long time, but… but there’s something wrong with our memories. I can remember a week with one man, and a month with another, but the pieces don’t fit together.”

“I don’t understand why I acted the way I did,” the second one said. “One day I’m a vapid slut, and the next I’m a clever poet? Most of it doesn’t feel like me.”

“That’s because it wasn’t. This isn’t going to be fun to hear, but there’s some good news at the end, so try not to let it overwhelm you, alright?”

They exchanged a concerned glance, and said, “yes, master,” in unison.

“Your memories are confused because they aren’t really yours. The hall doesn’t really have a staff of women that work here for hundreds of years. It’s more like… how did you put it, Alanna?”

“A pot of soup,” she said. “The hall is like a mystic cauldron, filled with a broth made from the souls of saucy women. When a wench is needed the hall pours out a measure of soul soup to make her, and when her work is done she goes back into the pot again. It can mix in different ingredients to make the kind of woman it wants, to serve whatever dream or desire an einherjar might have, but it throws away the parts that are forbidden. Parts like understanding how the hall works, or hating the einherjar.”

They went a little pale as she talked, and their hands came together to clutch at each other. But they kept their wits.

“So… the hall made us for you, not five minutes ago?” The second one asked.

“Yes.”

“We’re just some kind of magic puppets?” The first one said, sounding a little panicked.

“No,” I said firmly. “You might not have been born like normal people, but you’re real women now. That’s what’s so disgusting about the whole scheme. You could have real lives, with your own hopes and dreams, and do anything that anyone else could do. What the Hall does basically amounts to killing the staff whenever they aren’t needed. That’s why it’s important for you to understand that I’m going to be needing you twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week for as long as I’m here. No breaks for you, and definitely no going back in the soup pot. Understand?”

Your average person probably would have fallen apart in hysterical denial at that point, but these two were anything but normal. They shared another of those looks, seeming to draw strength from each other.

One of them licked her lips, and gave me a shaky nod. “Understood, master. I think that will work, at least for now. Thank you. This is… I… are you going to save us, somehow?”

“That’s the plan,” I said.

“Why would you want a pair like us?” The other objected. “If you asked for us, you must know what treacherous bitches we are.”

“You know everything the hall could provide about how to deceive and manipulate men,” I agreed. “Also how to sneak around getting into trouble, how to fight if you have to, and maybe even a little magic if there was any to be had. But you’re perfectly capable of loyalty, too. You just don’t give that out to people who don’t deserve it. Right?”

“You know us better than we know ourselves,” the first one admitted.

Her companion’s eyes narrowed. “You need us for something,” she declared. “Something that calls for those skills. But you weren’t expecting the hall to make us devoted to you. Were you hoping to gain our loyalty with an offer of rescue, master?”

“I was hoping you’d be smart,” I said approvingly. “Yes. I’ve been studying soul magic, and I think I can see how to steal you from the hall.  You’d be ghosts if I took you back to Midgard, but I can also grow soulless bodies and bind you into them so you can be properly alive. It will take some work, and I’m sure it would get me in hot water with the gods if they catch me, but I think I can pull it off as long as I chose the right moment to do it.”

“Freya’s tits! What kind of wizard are you, master? I didn’t think anyone had the power to do that.”

Alanna draped herself over the arm of the chair to lean against me. “Our wizard is the most powerful man in the world, girls. Daniel, you should name your new minions.”

“Minions? Should we just go with Mook One and Mook Two, then?” One of them complained.

“What, like we aren’t going to jump to do anything he says after an offer like that?” the other one told her. “I’ll happily be a minion for a master who can raise the fucking dead. But your dryad is right, master. There’s power in the giving of names.”

“I suppose so,” the first one conceded, and turned back to me. “What will it be, then?”

“Hmm. I know most people here are Nordic, but with the red hair and freckles you two look more Irish. I don’t imagine it matters much to you?”

“You can make us rakshasa for all we care, master. As long as we’re together, and not here.”

“Alright, then.” I put my hand on her head, and looked into her eyes. “You are Caitlyn.”

I turned to the other, and did the same thing. “You are Fiona. Happy?”

“I’ll be happy when we’re out of this fucked up situation, master,” Caitlyn said. “But I like the names. They’re exotic.”

“Exotic is good,” Fiona agreed. “So, what do we need to do for you, master?”

“Some very dangerous assassins are trying to kill me,” I told her. “I need you two to make sure I don’t get poisoned.”

“Oh, is that all?” Fiona said. “That’s easy, master. We’ll just hang out in the kitchen and watch your food being made. Unless you think they’d poison the whole band to get at you?”

“Only the most dire of magical poisons would have any chance of killing our wizard,” Alanna put in. “The faintest taste of such things would kill a hall wench, or even an einherjar.”

“Ah, so they can’t taint the ingredients or the cook is liable to die halfway through using them,” Fiona said. “They’d have to suborn a cook, or tamper with the meal after it’s prepared, or perhaps poison your tankard instead. We’re probably the main targets, then.”

“That will be fun,” Caitlyn said. “Can we have weapons, master?”

“I’ll see what I can come up with. But these guys are way too tough for you to fight unless you catch them completely off guard, so you’re better off avoiding that if you meet one. They can probably turn invisible, or hypnotize normal people into forgetting about them, or something like that.”

Fiona chuckled. “They won’t have much luck hypnotizing us, master. But we’ll keep our wits sharp, never fear.”

“Good. That should buy me some time to deal with my other vulnerabilities.”

I’d been thinking about the fight with the assassin, comparing it to my previous battles, and I couldn’t help but conclude that I’d been making a serious mistake. For the last few weeks I’d invested almost all of my time in projects like building fortifications and gearing up my troops. Things that were important if I wanted to save as many people as possible, from both the monsters and the ice age Loki had brought down on Europe. But none of that would matter if I died.

Wizards in this world get most of their firepower from their equipment, because building powerful spells on the fly doesn’t work nearly as well as patiently enchanting them into a magic item beforehand. But my own equipment was just a haphazard assortment of trinkets I’d thrown together in odd moments. It was woefully inadequate for facing down gods and divine monsters, and with Ragnarok underway it was all too likely that I’d find myself facing that kind of foe before long.

Had I done that on purpose? When I used to play role-playing games I’d often hold back from fully exploiting the rules, just to make things easier on the game master. Games like that usually have all sorts of horrible exploits that a clever player can use to make their character unreasonably powerful, which tends to ruin a game. Had I subconsciously let that habit carry over into the real world, when lives were on the line?

Or was I just afraid of where it would go? Just the straightforward ideas I’d already explored had given me weapons that could break an army. If I really went all out I was going to attract attention, and I might well end up sharing the same fate as Atlantis. I couldn’t see the gods tolerating the existence of a wizard who could actually fight them.

Well, it didn’t matter now. If I didn’t go all out against the Lightbringers they were going to kill me, end of story. So it was time to combine everything I’d learned about magic in this world, and make myself some real gear.

Regrowing my leg took up the rest of the evening, but at least it gave me time to plan. I started out the next morning with another trip into town. This time I wore Alanna in full plate armor form, and a squad of Gustav’s men followed me around everywhere I went. I was still a little nervous about being out in public, and kept a close eye on my surroundings, but I had some purchases I needed to make.

The elves who ran most of the clothing stores in Asgard were better craftsmen than any human, using magic to speed their work and often adding enchantments into the final product. They were also used to selling to impatient Viking warriors, so most of them were prepared to do minor alterations on the spot. That was convenient, since it meant that I could buy new clothing that fit properly without ever letting it out of my sight.

I bought a surcoat first. A loose tunic of dark fabric designed to be worn over armor, that covered my whole torso. Usually they’d be embroidered with a coat of arms, but I had them leave mine blank. It had an elegant little set of enchantments that would make it shed dirt and water, repair minor damage and ensure it didn’t pick up any stains or smells. I had them leave the enchantment unsealed, so I could add more magic of my own, and went on to the next shop.

The hooded cloak that I bought was made of thin, supple leather, with the same utility enchantments as the surcoat. It also had warmth and waterproofing enchantments, and a neat spell that made the edges stick together like Velcro when it was held closed. I got a kick out of the spell that made it flap dramatically in the slightest breeze when it was left hanging open.

After that I found a thin pair of gloves, and a good set of boots that would be a size too big for me if Alanna wasn’t armoring my feet. Then I retreated to my rooms at Moon Ghost Hall to do some serious crafting.

The enchantment factory I built needed its own power stone, a big one like I’d used for my gold factory, and even so it took several minutes to run through its program. It could have been faster, but for once I’d decided to go for quality instead of expedience. So it took its time laying down its enchantments, letting the magic sink deeply into the metal and grow as strong as I could make it.

It started by conjuring a little hexagonal bit of tungsten, maybe half the size of a dime, with a sharp prong sticking out of the back. When the prong was stuck through a sheet of leather or fabric a little single use-enchantment on the tip would make it flatten into a disk, and then the shaft of the pin would shrink until the whole thing was held firmly in place.

The pin was enchanted to store mana, with a decent storage capacity and a power link designed to connect to a conduit enchantment in the fabric it was attached to. The most powerful structural reinforcement effect I could create ensured that the hexagonal plate could shrug off canon fire, and a force enchantment extended out from each face to latch onto the adjacent plate and prevent them from being pulled apart. I estimated that a piece of cloth covered in pins would end up being as durable as several inches of solid steel, and that was the least important of the defensive enchantments.

The wards that covered each plate were more important, protecting it from a wide variety of spell effects and making it quite difficult to push any magic past it to attack the wearer. They covered an area several times larger than the plate, so the fields from adjacent pins would overlap to form a dense web of protection. I figured that would give Alanna a good defense against whatever fancy spells the Lightbringers might come up with to kill a dryad, once they figured out what they were dealing with.

I was getting pretty annoyed with the way so many of my more sophisticated foes just ignored my force fields, so I put some thought into making a more reliable defense mechanism. What I came up with was a setup where each pin would conjure a little hexagonal plate of tungsten maybe half an inch above itself, and hold it in place with force magic. Anything that hit the floating plate would push it in against a powerful repulsion field, which would also repel any liquids or gases that might get conjured or injected at the point of impact.

The acid-conjuring dagger the assassin had used on me would be useless against that defense, and so would any sort of blunt weapon or explosion. The force effects involved were easily strong enough to bounce artillery shells, although the impact would send me flying. Tungsten is harder than steel, and I added a mechanism to layer some structural reinforcement onto the floating plates, so cutting through them wouldn’t be easy either. A really good magic sword might be able to do it, but the wielder would need superhuman strength to drive it through that kind of resistance unless it had some kind of active spell effect along the edge. A disintegration effect, maybe, or something to weaken molecular bonds.

To guard against that sort of thing, I layered on a powerful dispel effect just outside the floating plates. That would disrupt active spells, making it a lot harder to apply any kind of magic to punch through my armor. Most of the attack spells I’d seen would just fall apart into a harmless spray of mana when they hit the dispelling. The physical energy of something like a fireball or lightning bolt would go through it, but without any magic to control or shape it that sort of thing would be a lot less dangerous.

What else could I do to make this layered defense as impenetrable as possible?

Conjuring tungsten took stupidly huge amounts of mana, almost as much as gold. So instead of recreating the floating plates every time I turned on my defenses I’d have to keep them around. Make each pin grow its floating plate when it was hooked up to a mana supply, and use force magic to keep it snug against the base plate when it wasn’t deployed. Then I had to add a repair function to fix damaged plates, and tinker with their size and arrangement so they wouldn’t interfere with my movement. I ended up making the floating plates just slightly smaller than the base plates of the pins they were attached to, and writing a clever bit of code to make adjacent pins hover their plates at slightly different distances so they didn’t lock together if the underlying cloth flexed the wrong way.

On the good side, this approach meant that the floating plates could get a really powerful reinforcement enchantment instead of just a quick and dirty version. But the tiny gaps between them meant they wouldn’t work as well against something like a high-velocity water jet as they did against solid weapons, so I decided to add a normal force field between them and the dispel field. Then I realized that walking around with that dispel field destroying any magic I touched was liable to be inconvenient, so I wrapped a much weaker force field around it just to keep people from accidentally bumping into it.

At that point I had a defense that would laugh at any of the weapons I was currently carrying, so I figured it was good enough for now. I set the factory running, slowly churning out enchanted pins, and started thinking about how to get them in place. It would take hundreds of them to properly cover the surcoat I’d bought, and the cloak might need a thousand. Maybe I could make something that would place them automatically, using telekinesis to uniformly tile a surface?

“Don’t be absurd, Daniel,” Alanna scoffed. “Why should you waste time and magic creating such a thing, when you have a skilled seamstress and armorer at your disposal? This is little different than the more elaborate sorts of studded armor. Finish enchanting these garments, and I shall place the studs by hand.”

“But that could take days,” I objected.

“And how long will it take you to make some mystic wonder to do the job?” She asked. “Besides, you underestimate my skills. A few minutes of work every hour will keep up with the fruiting of this lazy tree you’ve made, and it will give me something to do besides worry. Focus on the tasks only you can do, and allow me to handle the mundane chores.”

“I suppose you have a point. Alright, Alanna, I’ll leave the assembly work in your hands. It’s going to take several days to make enough pins to cover everything, though. Where do you think we should start?”

“The cloak,” she said firmly. “I’ll start with the hood, and work my way down. Now that they know a knife to the kidney won’t kill you, they’re liable to go for your head.”

Chapter 13

A cold drizzle fell over the Golden City as the Moon Ghosts assembled for the mock battle I was to take part in. I’d dragged myself out of bed before dawn for an early breakfast, silently grumbling to myself about irritating schedules that don’t take a mage’s habit of working late into account. Alanna just laughed at my sluggishness, and told me to get used to it.

“War waits for no man’s convenience, and our future shall surely be filled with battle,” she told me.

An hour later I found myself standing in the rain alongside the rest of the Moon Ghosts, in a plaza full of soldiers. The men bore the weather stoically, but I couldn’t help wondering about it. Wasn’t Asgard supposed to be some heavenly realm of perfection? Did Odin summon up foul weather for his men to fight in on purpose, or was this some reflection of the Fimbulwinter that blanketed Midgard?

Not that I had much reason to complain. Alanna’s armored form was probably waterproof to begin with, and a little rain certainly wasn’t going to penetrate my new cloak. The morning chill wasn’t even worth mentioning, when my enchantments were designed to weather arctic conditions. But I hated to waste my time standing around when I had so much work to do.

“What are we waiting for?” I asked Captain Arnor.

“They won’t open the gate until the whole battlegroup is drawn up and ready to march through,” he replied. “Until then it’s hurry up and wait, as usual.”

“Gate? What gate?”

He raised an eyebrow at that. “Did you think we’d march all the way to the battlefield? Asgard is surrounded by forty leagues of farmland, and the Vanir would never stop bitching if we ruined their crops. There’s a gate in the plaza here that will take us out to the battlefield.”

“That’s convenient. Does the battlegroup we’re fighting use the same gate?”

“That would give us too much free intel on each other. No, there are nine gate plazas in Valhalla, and each of them can open anywhere within a hundred leagues of the Golden City. For these training battles each force marches through a different gate, then they give us our objective for the day.”

I considered the implications of such a system. “So when Loki marches his army near Asgard you’ll be able to appear anywhere you want to engage them? You rangers are going to have a lot of fun with that, aren’t you?”

“That we will, Daniel. Hel’s navy will have a devil of a time protecting their transport ships, and the frost giants will have it even worse. There are only a few passes for their armies to march through, and more importantly for their supply lines.”

A stir went through the crowd then, and I felt a surge of magic from the middle of the plaza. Sure enough, someone had just opened a gate there. This one was just a shimmering field of golden energy, with no physical pillars or arch to outline it. But the glow was bright enough that it would be hard to misjudge where the edges were, even in daylight.

The band of troops nearest the gate immediately began to march through at a rapid pace. There were easily a couple thousand men gathered here, but the gate was wide enough for them to go through four abreast, so this wasn’t going to take long. Maybe ten minutes?

“Looks like I’d better find the commander, and see where he wants me,” I said. “It won’t hurt anything if I fly through over the heads of the men, will it?”

“Nah, we train that sort of thing with the Valkyrie sometimes. I still can’t believe he hasn’t already briefed you, though. He’s seen you fight. Surely he knows what role he’ll need you for?”

I shrugged. “Maybe he wants to see the terrain first? Good luck out there.”

I rose into the air, and zipped across the plaza to pass through the portal. It was a good fifteen feet high, and the unit passing through right now was all sword-and-board infantry, so there was plenty of room.

The other side was at the bottom of a small bowl-shaped valley surrounded by hills. The ground was rocky, with patches of grass broken up by stretches of exposed rock and the occasional large boulder. The slopes were steep enough to be tough going in most places, but at least it wasn’t raining here.

I glanced up at the overcast sky, and amended that thought. It wasn’t raining yet, but it obviously wouldn’t be long. Great. What a lovely day to be outdoors.

Sure enough, Caspar’s command group had already gone through. A group of aids was setting up an awning over a large, suspiciously flat-topped rock where someone had laid out a map. Caspar and a couple of other officers were standing next to it, having an animated discussion. I flew over and landed at the edge of the group.

“Daniel!” He called. “Just in time. How far can you see from the air?”

I looked up, and considered the question. “Depends on the weather, and what I’m looking for. In these conditions I can find their main body easily enough, but small groups would be easy to miss. If they disperse and take advantage of the terrain there’s a good chance I could lose them.”

“That’s fine, I just want to know which direction they’re in before we deploy. Today is a mutual search and destroy mission, so they could be anywhere.”

“Alright, I’ll take a quick look and come back,” I said.

“Don’t go straight up,” one of the officers called as I lifted off. “They know you’re on the field today, and we’ve trained to fight with air support. They’ll have spotters looking for you, so don’t give away our position.”

“Good to know,” I replied.

I rose just high enough to pass over the gathering army, and zoomed off towards the mountains that dominated the western horizon. They were the best landmark I could see from here, and I really didn’t want to embarrass myself by getting lost. I passed over a ridge line into another valley, crossed that and climbed the slope of a taller hill before gaining altitude.

Flying never gets old. The rugged hill country dropped away below me, and a breathtaking vista spread out all around. From half a mile up I could see that the horizon seemed to be much further away than normal here. We were in the foothills of a mountain range, which ran north and south as far as I could see. To the east the hills extended another few miles, and then flattened out into a broad expanse of lush farmland. Little clusters of colorful buildings dotted the plain, connected by a branching network of roads paved with yellow bricks.

Far off to the northeast, I could make out an improbably massive wall rising to enclose a settlement vast enough to look like a proper city even to my jaded 21st century eyes. That was obviously Asgard, even if it was too far away for me to pick out any familiar landmarks.

About the same distance to the south, the farmland ended in a rocky coastline. Beyond that an ocean stretched off as far as I could see. There were a few small settlements along the coast, and while ships were just tiny dots at this distance I could see a surprising number of them.

So this was where the battle of Ragnarok was supposed to take place?

I wondered what preparations Odin had made, with hundreds of years to scheme. If I were in his shoes that whole plain would be a killing field, one way or another. But I wasn’t here to scout out Asgard’s defenses.

I turned my attention to the hills and valleys below me. Caspar’s army was easy to spot, still assembling in the valley I’d come from. But where was the enemy? The nearest valleys all looked empty, and I was pretty sure I couldn’t miss two thousand men drawn up outside a gate.

Then again, our opponents were probably a lot better at this than Caspar. What were the chances they had an effective system for hiding troop movements from a flying scout?

Yeah, just about a hundred percent. Instead of looking for people or visible movement I concentrated on my mage sight, and tried to pick out the gate.

Aha!

It was an elegant spell, with layers of baffling to smooth out the disturbance it caused in the local mana field. But it isn’t easy to hide a spell powerful enough to teleport an entire army hundreds of miles. The best they could do was make it stand out like a searchlight instead of like the sun, and that wasn’t nearly good enough.

Once I’d spotted the magical signature it was easy to find the glow of the gate itself. But sure enough, there was no army gathered around it. At this distance, with the haze of impending rain in the air, I could barely make out the tiny shapes of men marching through the gate. After passing through they immediately turned and started to spread out, their camouflage-patterned cloaks blending into the rocky ground as they moved away.

On the good side, the guys I could see were headed off at an angle that took them away from Caspar’s army. So they probably didn’t know where we were, they were just doing some kind of pre-planned deployment maneuver.

I dropped straight down to the hilltop below me, and then headed down the slope a bit until I was sure the terrain would hide me before circling back. It added a few minutes to the trip, but I made it back to Caspar’s little command post just before the gate closed.

“Finally,” he grumbled. “What took you so long?”

“Making sure they couldn’t see where I was going,” I replied, moving to the map. “They’re northwest of us, several miles away. Let’s see. There’s the narrow valley, so that must be the hill with the pointy top… there, that should be the valley where their gate opened. But they’re dispersing right out of the gate instead of assembling like we are, and their men are all camouflaged. It’s going to be hard to spy on them from the air without giving our own position away.”

Caspar studied the map with an eager look. “That’s fine. Let Rurik throw his troops into confusion trying to hide from eyes in the sky. We shall strike hard while he’s busy casting about for our whereabouts, with his men too dispersed to resist. As for you, Daniel, I have a special mission for you. I’m sending the Moon Ghosts to skirt around the battlefield to the west, and find Rurik’s command post. I want you to go with them, and cut a path through any opposition they encounter.”

I had to raise an eyebrow at that. “Is there some reason I shouldn’t just cut a hole through the middle of his army instead? I’d do more damage that way, and it’s not like they can stop me.”

“As if a man with Rurik’s experience would fall for something so obvious,” Caspar scoffed. “I didn’t bring you here to waste time arguing, wizard. Get moving.”

I shrugged. “Suit yourself.”

It looked to me like he was overthinking the situation, but whatever. I was a little skeptical about our odds of finding the enemy commander, since he was bound to have his own rangers out. But I could at least make sure the Moon Ghosts didn’t get wiped out in an ambush, so maybe they’d be in a better mood at the end of the day.

Once we were away from the clearing Captain Arnor called me over to confer, while his men deployed into a series of smaller teams.

“What can I expect from you in a fight?” He asked.

“Lots of fire and explosions,” I replied. “I can blow things up very effectively, although my accuracy falls off at longer ranges. I can also throw up magical barriers that will take a good beating before they collapse, or use earth magic to make obstacles. My wards will stop any normal weapon, or even most magic ones, and unlike most wizards I can throw out attacks all day without exhausting my power.”

He grimaced. “The damned popinjay should have put you in the middle of the line, and let you cut down the enemy’s main body.”

“Yeah, but he’s not interested in listening. So, do you want to do this loud and fast or slow and quiet?”

“How loud are we talking?” He asked.

“Well, I’ve got some single-target spells that are good for quiet takedowns. But my big AoE stuff is about as subtle as calling down lightning bolts.”

It occurred to me to be impressed that this language had a concise word for area of effect attacks. English didn’t develop a term like that until the advent of big multiplayer fantasy games, and gamer slang is designed more for easy typing than speech. I suppose having real wizards here led to some divergence in language development.

“Alright, then I want you here in the forward response team,” he decided. “I’m going to skip over the usual skirmishing and push for a speed run today. Hold your magic until we get tangled up in the enemy rangers, and then I’ll want you to take out archers and anyone dumb enough to clump up while we fight our way through them. Our strategy here is to hide the fact that you’re with us as long as we can, and then move fast enough to do some real damage before they can redeploy.”

“Got it. Think we can really catch their command group?”

“Not a chance,” he scoffed. “Commander Rurik isn’t going to have all his officers in one place like the popinjay. Not when he knows he’s up against a wizard. He’ll have worked out plans and contingencies beforehand, and dispersed his commanders with their units. He knows these hills like the back of his hand, so he’ll be tucked away in some hidden vantage point where no one can find him but his messengers. Even if we did take him out his second would just take command, and carry on with their plans. But orders are orders.”

“Yeah, that’s what I figured.”

Note to self: trying to match wits with some military genius who’s been fighting practice wars for hundreds of years is a losing proposition. If I ever have to fight these guys I’d better keep things simple, and just use overwhelming firepower to clear the field. But it would be better to stand back and let Loki bury them in monsters. The more casualties both sides take in this war, the better off I’ll be afterward.

Hmm. How was Loki planning to beat an army that gets to resurrect all its casualties every evening? There must be a limit on how fast the Halls can bring them back, or something along those lines. But still, I was starting to see how Odin thought he could win this.

The Moon Ghosts loped out of the mustering area at a pace most men would have had trouble sustaining on level ground. I kept up by using my flight magic at low power to negate most of my weight, but it was still a pretty brutal pace. We swept west over a ridge line, followed a trail along a rocky slope for a bit, and then paused briefly just below the peak of a hill while a couple of scouts crawled up for a look.

“No movement,” they reported after a few minutes.

“Guess you really did get away without being seen,” Captain Arnor mused. “Otherwise they’d have a light band doing a rush down the slot to hit the popinjay’s command post while our main body is marching the other way.”

“Sounds like you really know how this guy thinks.”

He shrugged. “You fight a few thousand battles over the same terrain, you get a feel for what’s possible there. The flow of battle can only go so many ways, no matter how clever your commanders are. Alright, they’ve had time to get an observation post up on the Sharp Roost by now, so we’ll have to take the Lower Trail to keep out of sight. When we come out into the Boulder Field we’ll break up into teams and keep ten yard intervals so we’re harder to spot. Let’s move.”

The rest of the men obviously knew exactly what he was talking about. As the company circled down the west side of the hill I reflected that this reminded me of the way veteran players in those online battle arena games talk about strategy. Every map has a ‘meta’ - a set of tactics people have discovered over the course of thousands of games, that dictates the best moves and countermoves on that particular terrain. I guess something similar happens when you fight real battles over the same terrain enough times.

Our first contact with the enemy came as we were picking our way through the rocky maze they called the Boulder Field. It looked like some giant had dumped a bag full of house-sized rocks onto an open field, and then kicked them around some to create lots of broken rubble. I could see how it would be a challenge for sentries on a distant hilltop to spot a group sneaking between the boulders, especially since the company had broken up into smaller groups by that point.

I couldn’t even see what happened, thanks to a boulder that was in the way. One moment we were jogging along, and the next the clang of metal on metal filled the air from somewhere up ahead. I tensed, and drew my revolver. But by the time we reached the scene the fight was over.

Two Moon Ghosts were dead and another wounded, just like that. There were a couple of bodies with another unit’s insignia laid out next to them, and blood splashed liberally over the cold stone.

“Scouting party,” one of the men said, like that explained everything. The way Captain Arnor nodded in response, maybe it did.

“Push on until we find an ambush,” the captain decided. “Then we’ll see how sharp the Night Claws are this time around.”

Again, that was all it took to get the whole company moving again. I caught glimpses of the squads rearranging themselves as we set off, adjusting their formation with nothing but a few gestures. Okay, it made sense that a ranger unit would have some kind of sign language, just like modern special ops forces. But I remembered how much shouting, swearing and general struggle it took for Captain Rain to get my own troops to perform even the simplest maneuvers. The contrast was pretty amazing.

“They won’t try a serious ambush down in the Boulder Field,” Captain Arnor explained in a low voice as we wound our way through the rocks. “The sight lines are crap, and it’s too easy to get encircled. But keep a sharp eye out when we start up the slope on the other side. There’s a couple of good choke points where a response team could try and hold us off, so keep your head down until I see what we’re dealing with.”

A few drops of rain fell around us as he spoke, and quickly turned into a steady drizzle.

“Will do. Time to close up, Alanna.”

I’d had her stick with an open-faced helm while I was talking to people, but given the skill level I was seeing I suspected that was asking for an arrow to the face. My force field ought to stop attacks like that, but I was done relying on just one layer of defense for anything.

Finally, Alanna replied.

In a matter of seconds the helm’s nose guard and cheek protectors grew out to merge into a solid plate that covered the lower half of my face, and then extended down over my chin. Little holes appeared around the mouth area, enough to let sound through but far too small to admit an arrow or dart. Thick plates of something transparent grew out to cover the eye holes, protected by reinforcement spells.

“Nice trick,” Captain Arnor commented, before turning his gaze back to the terrain.

We made it through the boulder field without any further encounters, and started up a ravine that would let us bypass the next hill instead of climbing it if we could get through. The men were obviously expecting to find a blocking force somewhere along the narrow passage, but instead we reached the far end without incident.

Arnor frowned as we came out onto a barren hillside. He paused for a moment to peer through the worsening rain at the rocky hills all around us, as if searching for some sign of the enemy. Not that he was likely to find any, with the way visibility was dropping.

“What’s he playing at?” He murmured. “They can’t have been that far out of position.”

“Want me to go up and take a look around?” I asked. “The way the weather is going, that won’t be an option for much longer.”

“No, we’ll press on. If Commander Rurik has guessed that you’re with us he’s probably moving to force a quick engagement with our main body, and if that’s the case we need to get in position to hit their flank. But keep a sharp eye out. We should have run into a screening force before now.”

Ten minutes later we were climbing another rocky slope when a volley of magic arrows suddenly rained down from the ridge line above. Most of them hit, which confirmed my worries about the accuracy of enemy snipers, and one glanced off of my force field.

The Moon Ghosts all found cover before I could blink. Several more arrows bounced off my force field in the moment it took me to realize what was happening, and find a boulder of my own to huddle behind. I turned to the captain, who’d ended up behind the same cover, and found him frowning again.

“Problem?”

“It’s an odd site for their ambush,” he replied. “Not a bad position, but we’ve already passed better ones. They should have been set up further out, unless they were busy with something else while we were marching here.”

“Want me to clear the ridge, or should I just keep my head down while you work?”

“They’ve already seen you, so there’s no point in trying to hide any longer. Show us your mettle, wizard.”

“Heh. Watch this.”

I launched myself into the air, rising over the top of the boulder and opening up on the ridge line above with explosive rounds. Several arrows were in the air before the first explosion went off, but they were too slow to hit me when I was flying. By the time they reached my position I’d risen another hundred feet, and the thunder of my attack sent the enemy diving for cover.

I had bullet factories for three different grades of explosive round in my revolver now, and I’d chosen the middle size. Each shot struck with the impact of a good-size bomb, conjuring several pounds of white-hot nickel-iron under the same pressure as the Earth’s core. The resulting explosions shattered boulders and dug out craters in the ground, showering the ridge with debris and molten metal. I arced high over the ridge, walking my fire back and forth across the enemy position. Rain flashed into steam, momentarily hiding the enemy, but I didn’t need to see them to cover their whole position with overlapping blasts.

Then I descended to land on the ridge, and survey the results of my bombardment. I drew Grinder, just in case, but didn’t turn it on yet. It seemed hard to believe anyone could have lived through that.

The steam cleared away, revealing a devastated landscape but no trace of the enemy. No bodies, or pieces of bodies, or even bits of armor. That was odd. I hadn’t used anywhere near enough firepower to obliterate bodies like that, so where did the archers go?

The rain abruptly turned to hail. Then a freezing mist rose up to cover the ridge, and the temperature plummeted so fast I actually felt it for a moment before my warmth enchantments adjusted to the change.

“What the hell?”

Something big and massively powerful slammed into me from behind, and sent me flying. But with the protection of my new cloak the blow didn’t even hurt, and I kept my wits. Instead of crashing into the ground I could no longer see, I fed power to my flight spell and rose into the air.

This is faerie magic, Daniel! Alanna exclaimed, just as I broke free of the fog bank. It covered the whole ridge line              we’d been trying to cross, rolled down the slope to engulf the rocks the Moon Ghosts were hiding behind and continued on to pool in the valley below.

“That’s a big spell,” I observed.

Not for the winter court, Alanna replied. Be careful, Daniel. They’re fond of deceptive glamours.

“Yeah, well, let’s just not play that game.”

I gathered my power, and began assembling a massive dispel field. I usually avoided spellcasting on this scale during a fight, because it took too long. But ground troops wouldn’t be able to reach me up here, and I didn’t feel like going down into the mist where they could trick me into shooting my own allies.

My spell was only half finished when I saw a sudden gathering of power, and a lightning bolt slammed down from the clouds above to strike me. My ears range from the thunderclap, and I lost lift for a second from sheer surprise. But I didn’t seem to be hurt.

“You alright, Alanna?”

I’m fine. It didn’t even breach my metal shell, she assured me. Did you see where the spell came from?

Yeah, but if they’re that eager to stop me I’m not going to let them interrupt my spell.

A second lightning bolt struck me. Once again, the blast was deafening, but it couldn’t actually hurt me. My force fields didn’t seem to be interacting with the lighting, but the thousands of tiny metal shields that floated above my new cloak and surcoat formed a conductive later that it couldn’t penetrate. All they were doing was heating up the metal, and considering that it was enchanted tungsten I wasn’t too worried about that.

I finished assembling my spell, and blanketed the slope with a dispelling. The icy mist dissolved into nothingness, and I caught a momentary glimpse of strange shapes struggling against each other on the ground. Then most of them dissolved as well, revealing the men of the Moon Ghosts who’d been cloaked in illusions. They paused in their fighting, looking around uncertainly.

I waited another moment, hoping the rest of the weirdness would turn out to be an illusion too. But no, apparently there really were a group of elves riding giant polar bears down there. There were only a handful of them, but the way they were wading through Captain Arnor’s men said something about how tough they were.

Then the fog rose up out of the ground again, hiding the melee from my sight. But this time it was just fog, without any illusions layered into it.

Oh, and this time I’d spotted the source of the spell. I switched my revolver to the big explosive rounds, and opened fire on a clump of boulders a few hundred yards away. Obviously I wasn’t going to be hitting anyone with a pistol at that distance. But the heavy bullets my weapon fired easily had enough inertia to carry that far, and with explosives you only have to get close. The first round struck the hillside, and sent up an enormous gout of flame and molten metal. After that I just held the trigger down, and walked my fire over the enemy wizard’s position.

The results were pretty impressive. My high-power rounds conjured several hundred pounds of molten metal, and my revolver could conjure a new round and fire it in a little less than a second. Huge gouts of flame erupted from the hillside, showering the whole area with broken rock and brilliantly glowing sprays of white-hot metal. Every plant in the area caught fire, and hissing puddles of molten metal accumulated in low spots only to be set flying again by the next explosion.

For maybe twenty seconds I turned the target zone into a flaming hell of sudden death. Then something massive and impossibly fast shot out of the mist, and slammed into me. My amulet’s force field strained for a moment before collapsing, and then my face was full of giant teeth as a heavy weight drove me to the ground.

I turned Grinder on, and stabbed the thing with my blade of screaming plasma. It howled, more in anger than pain, and tried to claw my armor open. But its claws just skidded across my shields, unable to penetrate despite the vortex of hungry magic that surrounded them. I fired a plasma jet into its face, and the hairy creature broke off its attack to shield its eyes with one beefy arm. By then the whirling disks of force that made up Grinder’s blade were up to speed, and I lopped its other arm off.

It howled again, and dissolved into the mist.

“What the fuck was that?”

A wendigo, Alanna said. A hungry spirit of wind and ice. They aren’t easily slain, but it won’t be eager for a rematch after that. Look out!

Two guys riding giant bears loomed out of the mist, swinging naginatas at me while their mounts tried to claw and bite. The blades shone with an icy blue radiance, and left trails of ice particles in the air as they moved. But they bounced harmlessly off my shields, and the claws and fangs of the bears didn’t fare any better.

I swung Grinder in wide arcs for a moment, trying to fend them off while I switched ammo types. Then I shot one of the bears with a bouncer round. The whirling blades of force that surrounded the bullet diced it to chunks in a shower of gore.

The elf who’d been riding it was untouched, seemingly immune to magic. He threw some kind of curse at me, an angry tangle of snarling black magic that clung and gnawed at my wards. I ignored it, and shot him twice in the chest.

Once again, the force blades didn’t seem to touch him. But the big iron bullets smashed right through his mail shirt, and reduced his chest to a bloody ruin.

His companion cloaked himself in an invisibility illusion, but it didn’t do him any good when I could still see his magic. I shot him next, and then turned my attention to the mist. Was that an air spirit maintaining the weather magic? Maybe I could free it, and get rid of our visibility problems.

Why the hell was a group of winter fae attacking an Asgardian military exercise? I had a bad feeling about this.

Chapter 14

Caspar didn’t get his victory.

Oh, the Moon Ghosts held up just fine with my support. Together we cut that winter fey ambush to ribbons, and went looking for more. But there were other faerie war bands in the mountains, and between their magic and the monsters they commanded they were damned near unstoppable. By the time we’d gotten back in contact both groups of Asgardian soldiers had taken heavy casualties, and the generals had called off the exercise.

Instead they opened a new gate in the middle of the combat zone, and ordered the two battle groups to combine forces and conduct a fighting retreat. I probably could have begged off at that point, but I didn’t want to look like a coward in front of my hosts. So instead I stuck around and helped them patrol the area, beating off two attempts to drop bombardment spells on the extraction zone and a clever attempt to scramble the gate’s teleport magic, until the survivors of the last band of troops came straggling in.

The winter fey were deadly foes, and I think more than half the men who’d marched out for the exercise died before we could withdraw. But they’d be back at sunset, and the faeries we’d killed would stay dead. Caspar was pissed as hell at losing the chance to improve his win ratio, but Commander Rurik seemed to think the affair was a draw at worst.

As for the Moon Ghosts, they were in a partying mood.

“Roofmistress!” Captain Arnor called as we marched into the hall. “Meat and mead for the men! Tonight we celebrate our first victory of Ragnarok, and we owe it all to our wizard. Come, Daniel. The seat of honor at this feast is yours.”

I took the chair to the right of his with a weary grin. Illusionist mages were a pain in the ass to deal with, and their fighters were good at getting into close combat where I couldn’t just blow them up. But the Moon Ghosts did pretty well against their monsters and bear cavalry as long as I kept dispelling the glamours. Somewhere up in the mountains, some faerie commander was probably bitching up a storm about the frustrating mage who kept screwing up their ambushes.

“Thank you, Arnor,” I said. “It isn’t exactly what the Allfather brought me here for, but it was a good workout.”

Fiona appeared at my side with a flagon of mead, and a relieved smile.

“Congratulations on your victory, master,” she said. “I’m glad you made it back.”

“We were worried when we heard about the faerie attack,” Caitlyn said, perching herself on the armrest of my chair as she examined me for injuries. “You should be careful. You won’t just come back at sunset if something happens to you.”

Arnor laughed. “Isn’t that just like a woman? Don’t fret, girls, our wizard is more than a match for a few faerie striplings. But he’s not the only hero of the hour. Boris! Don’t think I didn’t see that shot you made in the second ambush. Two hundred yards if it was an inch, and it took that mage right in the throat! That’s a new record for you, isn’t it?”

The women started laying food on the table while the men settled into their seats, boasting about their feats during the day’s battle. Doting girlfriends sat in their men’s laps or leaned over their shoulders, listening to each story with wide eyes. Weapons and armor were handed over to serving girls, who carried each man’s gear off to his room and returned with more servings of mead.

My twins blended into the crowd of pretty women, watching my back and carefully vetting the food and drink I was served. It kept them too busy to flirt and tease the way most of the other women did, but that was just as well. It wasn’t like I could do anything with them anyway. As long as they were bound to the hall they were still technically Odin’s servants, not mine, and that meant my coven binding considered them off limits.

Alanna was another story, though.

Are you sure you don’t want to come out and join the party? I asked her at one point.

It’s tempting, she admitted. But this would be the perfect time for an assassin to strike. I’ll not leave your back unprotected just to enjoy a little mead.

My new cloak covers my back pretty well, I pointed out.

It doesn’t protect your throat, or your eyes, she retorted. Just because I’m not covering your face right now doesn’t mean I’m not ready to shift at the first sign of danger. I shall not risk losing you, so please don’t tempt me.

Alright, suit yourself. I appreciate you being so protective, Alanna. I just feel bad that you can’t enjoy yourself because of it.

Then get us home as soon as you can manage it. I’ll trust Sefwin’s wit to keep assassins out of the palace, but I won’t rest easy until we’re safely behind your walls again.

That was a sentiment I could agree with. But I wasn’t any closer to a solution for our Aesir problem.

I’d learned quite a bit about the Atlantean style of enchantment from studying that rod, and the spells it could cast were a lot less mysterious to me now. The soul magic I’d learned from it was the main reason I’d felt comfortable asking the hall for Fiona and Caitlyn, since I was confident I could smuggle them out of Valhalla now. I’d have to bind them into a soul trap before I cut their link to the Moon Ghost Hall, but the rod had shown me how to do that kind of thing. I still wasn’t quite sure how to bind them into a living body properly, but Cerise had spells for that.

Unfortunately, I was now sure that the real problem was in the spire. The rod was supposed to be connected to a giant soul trap mechanism hidden somewhere inside the massive artifact, but that link was broken. If I wanted to fix it I’d have to go exploring inside that nightmare of broken magic, a prospect that gave me decidedly mixed feelings. I really wanted to get a look at the enchantments there, and see what I could learn from them. But crawling around inside that thing wasn’t going to be safe, even for me, and risking my life to help Odin didn’t sit right with me.

I was distracted from my musing when a curvy redhead plopped into my lap, and threw her arms around me. A tantalizing expanse of tanned cleavage filled my vision.

“Good job kicking ass today, ‘master’,” she said teasingly. “I bet there are some pissed off faeries up in the mountains tonight. We’re going to have to give you an extra special hero’s reward, aren’t we girls?”

Caitlyn chuckled. “I hope so. Usually he’s too busy with his familiar to have time for us.”

Wait a minute. This wasn’t one of the twins. But I recognized that voice.

“Mara?”

She snickered. “You should see your face, Daniel. Yeah, it’s me alright. Did you miss me?”

“What are you doing here?” Good God, the balls on this girl. How the hell did Loki’s daughter manage to infiltrate Valhalla on the eve of Ragnarok?

“I’m just itching for another dose of wizard dick, stud. You don’t mind helping a girl out, do you? I’m sure these guys could spare you from the party for… oh… a couple of hours?”

Arnor laughed, and clapped me on the shoulder. “You’ve got a saucy one there, Daniel. Go on, no need to hold back on enjoying the hall’s hospitality.”

Wait, he thought she was a hall wench? Come to think of it, the twins hadn’t questioned her presence either, and they were supposed to be on their guard. But how could anyone mistake Mara for one of the servants?

She jumped up, and dragged me to my feet with a laugh. “You heard the man. Don’t worry, guys, I’ll try not to break him.”

That broke me out of my shock. I swept the crazy demigoddess off her feet, and threw her over my shoulder. She shrieked in delight, and I gave her a firm smack on the butt.

“We’ll just see who breaks who,” I announced, and swept out of the hall.

She giggled, and kicked her feet ineffectually. “What are you doing, you silly wizard? Put me down! I’m not wearing anything under this skirt.”

“Well, that was naughty of you.” I reached under her skirt with my free hand, and groped her. Yep, she was telling the truth. Nothing under there but lusty woman.

She squirmed in my grip. “You know what a dirty bitch I am. What are you doing? Checking to see if your present is still there?”

It was. The little loop of enchanted gold had been intended as an earring, but the crazy girl had decided to hide it by using it as a clit piercing instead. She gasped when my fingers found it, but I ignored her reaction in favor of testing the enchantment. Yes, it was really mine. So this was the real Mara, and not some fake created by Odin to test me.

She whacked me on the back hard enough to stagger me.

“Hey! Are you listening? Stop that, or I’m going to cum all over your shiny new gear.”

“Really? Since when are you so easy?” I teased.

By then I was floating up the stairway that led to my rooms, so our only audience was the twins trotting along behind me.

“Since you unfucked my shit by fucking the shit out of me,” she shot back. “I could get off on a stiff breeze these last couple of weeks, so don’t blame me for being hard up when it’s all your fault. Are those your wards?”

I stopped at the door of the suite, and set Mara down. “Yeah, mine and Alanna’s. Girls, keep watch here and don’t let anyone in, alright?”

“Of course,” Fiona said, sounding a bit grumpy.

“When do we get a turn, master?” Caitlyn asked. “Or did you decide we’re too much to handle?”

Mara chortled. “Daniel! You’ve got your very own naughty twins, and you’re not fucking them? What’s wrong with you?”

“There’s mystical bullshit in the way,” I told them all. “It’s going to have to wait until I keep my end of our deal, girls. Besides, I need you on duty until I’ve got the assassins handled.”

“Assassins? What assassins? Who did you piss off this time?” Mara asked.

I opened the door, and ushered her through. The twins were pouting at me now, and I couldn’t take much of that. Maybe making them so manipulative hadn’t been such a clever idea after all.

Once the door was safely shut Mara turned to me inquisitively, but I shook my head. “Help me sweep the place for traps and spies, first. The wards haven’t been disturbed, but all things considered I’m not going to rely on just that.”

We didn’t find anything, and a couple of minutes later Mara cornered me in the bedroom. She put her hands on my chest, and looked up at me with eyes full of hunger.

“You got taller,” she said. “I like it. Hey, is this dryad armor? Nice! I bet you’ve got some little tree slut sucking you off under there, huh?”

Daniel, who is this bitch, anyway? I’m minded to put her in her place, Alanna grumbled.

“Her name is Alanna,” I told Mara. “And I know she’s seen you before, so why the hell doesn’t she recognize you? How did you even get here?”

“I’m undercover,” Mara replied with a mischievous grin. “You first, though. If some crazy guy is going to break through the window and try to kill you in the middle of shit, I need to know how to handle it. Assassins?”

“The Lightbringers think I’m an Atlantean wizard,” I said. “They’ve got an agent here trying to kill me, and I’m sure he’s sent for backup by now.”

“Oh. Shit. Well, why don’t you just tell them they’re wrong? They’ve got to have some way to test that.”

“Because they got their information by spying on Odin, and telling him that would cause even more problems. You didn’t think I was here of my own free will, did you?”

“Dad was wondering what you’re up to,” she replied. “I figured there was no way you’d leave your girls alone like this if you had a choice, but he thought you might be trying to make a deal to protect them. Big sis doesn’t want to lose any more troops to those wizard weapons of yours, so I can make you a better offer if that’s what it takes.”

“Honestly, I just want to defend my island and stay out of the main fight,” I said. “But I’m not sure that’s an option anymore. I showed up at the temple in Kozalin one day thinking the priest had something urgent to talk about, and found Odin and Thor waiting to shanghai me. I went along with it because I’d be a smear on the floor if I tried to say no, but I’m mostly just trying to get out of this in one piece.”

“That makes more sense,” she said. “Good, that means I can fuck you into a coma without worrying about heavy shit. I really have been missing you.”

Her hands went to my cloak clasp, and she deftly removed the garment.

“Crazy girl. What are you doing here?”

“I’m on a mission,” she said. She tossed the cloak onto a chair, and went for my tabard. “This is new. Hey, this overlapping shield thing is kind of cool.”

“Like I said, assassins. Why doesn’t anyone recognize you?”

“Divine magic,” she said smugly. The tabard joined my cloak, and she pushed me down onto the bed.

“But your aspects are fire and freedom,” I objected. “How do you get a secret identity out of that?”

She pinned me to the bed, and looked into my eyes. “Your dryad doesn’t need to hear about my secrets. But you should be able to figure it out if you think about it. Those are my aspects, but you know I’m not alone. My hidden partner is secrets and subterfuge.”

I’d seen Mara turn into a giant two-headed fox before. Most people would assume that was just a cosmetic thing, but I’d drawn a different conclusion. Two heads, two brains, two people. She had a twin sister sharing her body, like some mystical version of conjoined twins. It had never occurred to me to think about it before, but if Mara was a demigoddess it stood to reason that her sister would be too. Which meant she’d have her own aspects, which might or might not be the same as her twin.

I wondered, suddenly, if my realization had really been an accident. If Mara’s twin had secrecy as an aspect, shouldn’t her magic have kept me from suspecting her existence? Unless she’d wanted me to know about her. But why?

I didn’t have long to wonder, because Mara whipped off her top and tossed it over to land on the growing pile of discarded clothes. My eyes were immediately drawn to the tanned mounds of her breasts, sitting high and firm on her chest. She gave me a smug look, and rapped on my breastplate.

“Hey, Alanna, time to open up. You don’t really want to cockblock your wizard, do you? Your namesake wouldn’t do that.”

The layers of steel and wood melted away, reforming into a wiry female form draped against my side.

“I fear you’ve mistaken me for one of my admirers, Mara,” she said. “Perhaps I should credit you for knowing even that much of dryad lore, at your tender age. But be warned that any treachery will go poorly for you.”

Mara blinked at her in surprise for a moment, and then looked her up and down. “Whoa. Wait, are you saying you’re the Alanna? Alanna Firescorn, the immortal dryad?”

“I am.”

“And you’re Daniel’s familiar?”

“Yes.”

“How the fuck did you land the strongest dryad in Midgard, Daniel? Addict her to your magic dick? Drown her in mana? No, never mind, you can tell me later. Right now it’s time for my turn.” She kissed me fiercely, and then pulled away for a moment to tear my shirt off.

“Hey, easy on the clothes,” I protested. “Getting more here is a pain in the ass.”

Not that I really cared, with her grinding her breasts into my chest like that. Her body was hot under my hands, an enticing landscape of toned curves burning with barely controlled passion. She dragged her breasts slowly down my chest, and went for my belt.

“Want to double team him with me?” She asked Alanna. “I’ve never done a two-girl blowjob before, but I bet you could show me how it’s done.”

“Perhaps later,” Alanna replied, more calmly than I’d expected. “But first, I wish for you to reveal what mad scheme you seek to seduce my wizard into.”

Mara frowned at her. “Hey! I’m not like that. Can’t I just be happy to see my guy again?”

“Yet you fail to deny the charge. Come now, any fool can see that Daniel is fond of you. Set aside your womanly wiles, and lay out your case with words of reason instead. Surely he will not deny you, if your request is reasonable?”

Mara sagged, letting her face fall to rest against my belly. She sighed.

“Damn it, Alanna, I just wanted to have the reunion sex first. I wasn’t going to spring it on him in the middle of things, like some manipulative bitch.”

“No? Yet the thought comes quickly to mind.”

“Hel suggested it,” she admitted. She sat up, and glanced up at me with a surprisingly vulnerable look. “I just, well, look, I know I could say you owe me one, but I didn’t want you to feel like we’re just trading favors, Daniel. This thing we’ve got? It means more to me than that.”

I smiled, and held out the arm that wasn’t wrapped around Alanna. “Come here, you. No need to make things weird. I’m glad to see you, too.”

She settled herself against my side, and laid her head on my shoulder. I hugged her, and she made a happy little sound.

“So, what’s the story?” I asked.

“I’m here for mom’s third task,” she said. “The one where I get my immortality back if I survive.”

“That sounds like a good thing, but you don’t seem very happy about it. What are you supposed to do?”

“I’m here to free my brother.”

Alanna choked. “You can’t be serious. Fenrir? The Thunderer’s sons stand guard over his prison night and day. Mara, you’ve a respectable strength for one so young, but you can’t fight the likes of Hurd or Ragnik.”

“I don’t need to beat them, Alanna. I just need to get past them, and distract them for a minute while I get my furry brother free. Then he can eat them, and we ride out of Asgard before anyone can stop us. But it’s going to take everything I’ve got to break Gleipnir, so I need some help with the guards.”

“You want Daniel to fight a pair of godlings for you?” Alanna said incredulously.

“He’s done it before. Come on, Daniel, I know you can do it. These guys aren’t that much tougher than Korak, and you’ll have all your gear this time.”

“Can you really break the unbreakable chain?” Alanna asked dubiously. “How can you be so certain that your magic will succeed, where all Fenrir’s devouring power has failed?”

Mara actually rolled her eyes at that. “I’m not stupid, Alanna. I wouldn’t be here if I didn’t know how to do it. I’m sure these dumb Vikings think they’re real clever, but I figured it out the first time I heard the story of how they bound Fenrir. Think about the ingredients they used to make Gleipnir. The breath of a fish? The sound of a cat’s footfall? None of them are real things, Alanna. They bound him in an illusionary rope made from things that don’t exist, because you can’t devour nothing. But it isn’t only physical barriers that fall within my domain. I can free him from a conceptual prison, it’s just a little harder than a physical one.”

Alanna was silent for a moment. Then she reached across my chest, and put her hand on Mara’s shoulder.

“You’re more clever than one would expect from your manner,” she said. “I had thought you a mere servant to your passions at first, but now my eyes have pierced the illusion. Perhaps I can see why Daniel cares for you, beyond the lure of the flesh. Only, what happens when we return home, and the Aesir take their revenge on us?”

“If we time it right, Asgard will be under siege by then,” Mara told her. “But you don’t have to just hide, and hope they’re distracted. Dad’s ready to make peace with Hecate, and offer you a place in the alliance. You can be a general while the war rages, and have your own kingdom after we level this place. Dad doesn’t care about ruling Europe, he just wants revenge on the bastards that bound him to be tortured forever.”

“Maybe so, but Gaea wants to exterminate humanity,” I pointed out. “I don’t think she’s going to just let that go, as long as she’s been working on it. Besides, there’s a bigger problem. You’re assuming I’m just another wizard, and if I disappear and show up with your dad’s army the Aesir will shrug and decide they have bigger things to worry about. But they brought me here for something a lot bigger than you’d expect, and I’m sure they’re keeping a close eye on me. Considering what I know, I’d be amazed if I could get outside the city without a god or two showing up to stop me.”

Mara shrugged. “So Fenrir eats them too. Problem solved.”

“He can’t fight all the Aesir at once, Mara,” I objected. “Do you really think Odin doesn’t have a plan for containing him if he gets loose? They don’t want to get… eaten…”

I trailed off, struck by a sudden realization. I’d been wondering how either side thought they could accomplish anything in this war. Dying is only a temporary inconvenience to a god, since they can just reform their avatar as long as they have an anchor in the material world. Hecate had told me that family was an anchor, and practically all of the gods on either side of this war have divine relatives. So how would you ever sever their anchors? Maybe if you killed them all at once, but as long as both sides were closely matched that would be impossible.

But Hecate had mentioned how the old gods got around that kind of problem.

“That’s why the Aesir are so worried about keeping Fenrir imprisoned,” I realized. “He can devour gods. Like that thing your mom keeps in the basement, that we feed Korak to.”

Mara chuckled. “You just figured that out? Yeah, divine monsters can do that shit. Jormungandr is the same way. Only, the flip side is that all the mortals think giant monsters stay dead when you kill them, and that makes it a lot harder to claw your way back to life. Weapons like Gungnir and Mjolnir have magic that does the same thing, too. So our big boys can eat the enemy, but if they get killed we’d have to take a time out from the fight to do a resurrection ceremony if we want to get them back.”

“I could have told you this,” Alanna said. “But interesting as the intricacies of divine warfare may be, they do nothing to divert our current troubles from our trail. As long as Gaea bears a grudge we would not be safe with Loki’s army, and your mates would be at even greater risk.”

“Oh, come on, we can protect them,” Mara protested. “It’s not like Thor is going to show up at your island in person just to get revenge.”

“No, he’d do it to collect hostages,” I said.

“Daniel, what could you possibly be doing that would get that much of their attention? What, does old One-Eye think you can undo Fimbulwinter?”

“Worse,” I said. “He wants me to repair the Sunspire.”

“The what?”

“The Great Spire of the Sun,” Alanna explained. “The weapon that the greatest wizards and shamans of Atlantis dreamed into existence to subdue the power of the gods, and bring all the world under their dominion. The artifact that was so fearsome that all the world’s quarreling gods united to destroy it, and to break the dreams of men so that no one would ever dare to recreate it. Somehow, the Allfather has stolen it away from the dreams of drowned desolation where it has lain for five thousand years, and now he seeks to use it himself.”

Mara’s eyes had gone huge during Alanna’s recitation.

“Shit,” she breathed. “Daniel, we can’t let that happen. You won’t really… you can’t mean… Daniel, could you really fix it?”

“Yes,” I admitted. “I’m a mana sorcerer, Mara. When it comes to understanding magic, there’s not much I can’t do.”

“You wouldn’t, though. Right? I mean, he wouldn’t stop at using it on us. Cerise and Avilla would be upset if they lost their patrons.”

“Yeah, I know. Believe me, I don’t want to see what the world would look like if he had absolute power. The things he does when his influence is limited are bad enough. I’ve just been dragging my feet here, while I try to come up with a plan that doesn’t get me killed. Or worse. I could see him kidnapping the girls so he can torture them until I do what he wants.”

“If the carrot fails, the stick will soon follow,” Alanna agreed.

“Yeah. But I think I’ve finally gotten an idea. Mara, how would you feel about helping me fake my own death?”

Chapter 15

The inside of the Sunspire was a strange and confusing place. It was like reality itself was twisted within those crystal walls, superimposing two very different environments. Sometimes I flew through air, with strange vapors wafting across my shields and lightning discharges leaping between the walls at random intervals. Sometimes I flew through water, lit by the eerie blue glow that warned of far too much radiation for my peace of mind. The dimensions of the halls seemed to shift and bend as I passed, and even gravity didn’t seem stable.

A dream it began, and a dream it remains, Alanna murmured, when I remarked on the strangeness.

I paused to examine a wall covered in intricate gold circuit patterns that pulsed in some complex rhythm. Was that a space warping enchantment? This was only one section of a greater whole, and it might take hours of exploration to find enough of them to be sure. But it looked an awful lot like some kind of wormhole spell.

“You never did explain what you mean by that,” I said.

What is there to explain? Once men dreamed of having mastery over the forces that drive the world. Wind and rain, the sun and the moon, the great spirits and even the gods themselves. The dream shamans called their vision into the waking world, and the wizards who came with it forged this tower to bring it fully to fruition. But while weather and spirits bowed down before man’s ambitions, and the sun itself became a tool in their hands, the gods were not so easily broken.

So there was actually some kind of dream realm in this world? Interesting. But it begged a lot of questions.

“So there was a war, and the gods won?”

Not just a war. A cataclysm. The Atlanteans thought they could play one pantheon against another, and pick off their enemies one by one until the balance of power shifted decisively in their favor. I warned them it wouldn’t work, but they paid little heed to the words of a minor nature spirit.

“You were there?”

Of course I was, Daniel. Do you think I would pass up the chance to bind myself to a man with such grand ambitions? I was the favored familiar of Ivor Stormbinder, one of the council’s most feared battle mages. Luckily he made no use of me in the later battles, thinking the power of the sun would triumph against all foes.

“That’s when Atlantis was destroyed?”

Yes. The island of Atlantis was broken, sunk into the sea and cast back into dreams. But it was more than that. The Titans broke the Dreaming itself, crippling the aspirations of men with nightmares of failure and torment. No civilization has dared to reach so high since then. For two thousand years I thought even the power of invention was lost to men, until Prometheus restored it to you.

I broke off my inspection of what was probably a gigantic mana relay network to consider that revelation.

“So that’s what inspired the old legend about Prometheus giving men fire? I can see why Zeus would imprison him for that. But the gods couldn’t undo it?”

They were no longer united in purpose, Alanna explained. Perhaps he could have cursed his own people, but that would only have made them vulnerable to their rivals from other lands. In the end he decided that with the Dreaming still broken it was a bearable risk, and left well enough alone.

“At least I don’t have to worry about him coming after me. Or do I?”

The Olympians are as dead as any god can ever be, Daniel. Besides, Dark Hecate was a peer of their realm while Olympus stood, and are you not her champion? You have many worries, but that is not one of them.

Good. I had plenty of enemies, without worrying about new ones popping up out of nowhere. Although the thought reminded me that Bast was due to be reborn soon.

No, not Bast. Erika. My daughter, who was going to be born any day now. She might have already been born, and I wasn’t there.

It was a little thing, in the grand scheme of things. But I was surprised at how much I resented it. I’d meant to be there for Tina. Not that she was going to need any help, between her own motherhood blessings and Bast’s magic, and if she did I couldn’t imagine anything that Elin and Avilla couldn’t handle. It was probably going to be the easiest birth in Varmland’s history.

I’d still meant to be there, though. To hold her hand, and keep her safe. A man should be present for the birth of his child, even if she is some strange reincarnation of a goddess. I felt like a complete heel for being stuck in Asgard instead.

There was nothing to be done about it, though. I needed to focus on what I was doing now, or I might not make it home to Tina at all.

Case in point, the crystal tunnels I was trying to follow were broken here and there, exposing a maze of enchantments that often didn’t take well to being mangled. At one point I found a wall of lighting arcing across the hall in front of me, a brilliant snake of energy that writhed in the air while its endpoints danced up and down the walls. I had to stop there, and consider how to get past it.

My force fields didn’t seem to work very well against electricity, but my armor had held up against lightning bolts just fine. Would it protect me, if I brushed against that arc?

The only way to find out was to try it, and that struck me as a really dumb idea. Instead I conjured a heavy bar of iron spanning the width of the tunnel.

Sure enough, the arc of electricity immediately grounded out, conducting through the metal instead of forcing its way through the much higher resistance of the air. The metal bar quickly started to glow a dull red, and I hurriedly floated past before the current melted it.

It was intimidating, how much energy was at play in this place. Most of the enchantments I could see were inactive, and I was pretty sure things like that lightning were just eddies from some relatively minor set of housekeeping enchantments. But there was still so much current my face was warm from the heat.

Wait, no. I was getting warmer, but the heat didn’t seem to be coming from anywhere in particular. What the heck?

I’d turned a corner, and found myself in an open space full of broken crystal where something had apparently exploded at one point. Now my healing amulet was drawing power, too. I checked the radiation detector that I’d improvised last night, and saw that the warning light was flashing frantically.

I never did figure out how to make a proper Geiger counter, but when I’d been cooking up a radiation weapon to use on Gaea’s army I’d come up with an indirect way of measuring it. My flesh sorcery can sense radiation damage just like any other injury, so I’d ended up using rats in enchanted cages to check for radiation leaks.

Judging from the brightness of the glow on the back of my wrist, I’d already soaked up enough radiation to kill a few hundred rats. Enough radiation that it was actually warming me up as it tore my tissues apart. If not for my healing spells I’d already be dead, and that was just what was getting through my force field and steel armor.

“Draw on my sorcery, and heal yourself,” I warned Alanna. “We’re soaking up a lot of radiation here.”

That invisible death magic? I thought I felt something odd. Can your healing protect us?

“I think so, but I’d rather not take chances. Let me see if I can manage a better solution.”

My force magic can affect anything that has rest mass, but getting a force field to stop something exotic could take a bit of tuning. What was nuclear radiation actually made of, anyway? A bunch of different things, if I remembered my college physics classes right. Free protons and neutrons, helium nuclei, and high-energy photons. Well, the steel in my armor was thick enough that it would probably stop x-rays, and I should be able to block the rest of that. I just needed a force field tuned to stop tiny, incredibly fast-moving particles instead of big masses of normal matter.

The spell formed as I concentrated, expanding like an invisible ball of foam. It needed a lot more thickness than a normal force field, but as long as I was levitating there was plenty of space to work with. Six inches of thickness, and the glow from my radiation detector dimmed sharply. Another six inches and it faded a little more, getting down to a range I was sure my healing could handle. Just a few dead rats per minute, so to speak, and I’d tested that level in my lab.

But it wouldn’t go any lower, even when I ballooned my neutron shield out to several feet thick. I frowned, and shook my head at the obvious conclusion.

“Something in here is leaking gamma rays? Fuck. I’m not getting paid enough for this shit.”

You don’t think Aphrodite’s charms are worth the risk? Alanna teased. But think how happy Cerise would be, to have a chained goddess to play with.

“Yeah, until she seduces Sefwin into murdering us all in a fit of jealousy or something. No thanks. Alright, I’ve got a new ward up that stops most of this, but some of it is still leaking through so let’s not waste time.”

You’re the one who’s moving us, Daniel. Rush as fast as you like. Only, don’t forget to keep a wary eye for snares and pitfalls.

“Yeah, that’s why I’m not going faster. Alright, let’s see what this thing is.”

The far side of the devastated zone opened onto a towering central chamber that seemed taller than the whole Sunspire. Oh, joy. I wasn’t surprised to find that the inside of the spire was substantially bigger than the outside, but it was one more thing to worry about. Getting lost in here could be really bad.

The walls of the cylindrical space were covered with more golden circuit-pattern runework, forming an enchantment that dwarfed anything I’d ever seen. A harsh yellow glow lit the room from above, and a slender thread of eye-hurting brilliance descended through the center of the open space until it was swallowed by a crystalline engine hundreds of feet below.

I floated out into empty space, and a wall of stifling heat struck me for a moment before Alanna rewove her warmth spell into a climate control ward to keep us cool. I glanced up, and immediately regretted it. Whatever was up there was far too bright to look at, like staring into the sun with binoculars. I was blinded before I could even look away.

“This looks important,” I said, blinking away spots as my healing amulet fixed my eyes. Could I make a spell that would act like sunglasses? Invert a light spell, maybe? No, that wouldn’t work. No more looking up, then.

I think this must be the Hall of the Conduit, Alanna said. I was never allowed here when Atlantis stood, but I have heard it described.

“Conduit, huh? So what’s up there?”

The sun, Daniel.

“Wait, what now? You mean, like, the actual sun?”

Those enchantments on the walls of the chamber were colossal in scale, but full of familiar elements. Force fields, temperature containment, and something that reminded me of both the Dark Portal and the Asgardian gate spells.

Of course, the real sun. Of what use would an illusion be? I’m sorry, Daniel, I thought you knew this lore. Did I not tell you the Atlanteans tamed the sun to serve them?

“Yeah, I thought that was some kind of metaphor.”

No, I was being quite literal. The Sunspire is a needle that pierces the hide of the sun, and draws out its lifeblood to feed the Heart of Fire below us. What other source could empower such terrible weapons?

God good. It was a power tap.

The Atlanteans already had the equivalent of my mana stones, but they weren’t content with that level of power. So they’d built this insane artifact, enchanted to reach across a hundred million miles of space and tap into the energy of the sun to fuel their spells. I wasn’t sure how one would go about turning heat into mana…

No. My sorcery showed me exactly how to do it. It was more sympathetic magic than particle physics, using a piece of the sun to draw power from the whole. Creating that link in the first place was an incredible feat, considering the distances involved, and there was an immense amount of power tied up in maintaining the wormhole bridge. But the amount of power you could draw from such a link would be… five percent of the target’s energy output? Maybe ten? No, wait. Not energy output. Energy content. Ten percent of the Sun’s total heat energy.

That was enough power to not only kill everyone on Earth, but blow the planet apart and send the molten fragments careening off into interstellar space. Why the fuck did anyone think they needed that much power? How did they lose, with a weapon like this?

Well, no, they wouldn’t have been able to reach the theoretical limit. You need a soul to act as the conduit for that kind of magic. So the actual output would be limited by what the mages controlling it could channel. Or would they use themselves?

No, of course not. Why be hobbled by petty mortal limits?

“That’s what they did with the creatures they bound, isn’t it?” I said slowly. “The giant monsters and elemental spirits, and later on the gods they captured. They’re bound somewhere down below us, being used as cogs in the machine that channels the sun’s power into spells.”

Yes. Ivar boasted to his enemies that it was a tortured existence, bound in darkness and pain for all of eternity.

“I suppose that would be one way to build this thing. Let’s take a look, shall we?”

I descended quickly, carefully avoiding the vicinity of that burning thread of solar plasma. There was a hatch in the side of the shaft down near the bottom, that opened at the touch of the Devouring Rod I carried. It was probably intended as a maintenance access, like the cramped maze of tunnels it connected to. But the mechanisms here were all intact, and it only took a few minutes to find my way down into the chamber my sorcery was telling me must exist.

The reactor room was a spherical open space that was definitely too big to fit inside the Spire’s outer dimensions. A giant ball of seething plasma a hundred feet across hung in the middle of the space, putting out enough heat to cook an unprotected person in seconds. I covered my eyes against the glare, until Alanna grew lenses of smoky glass over my helmet’s eye holes.

Even with that protection, I still couldn’t look straight at the miniature sun. But I could make out the neatly organized structure of spun crystal and circuit traceries that surrounded it, supporting hundreds upon hundreds of dark spheres.

The small ones were the size of bowling balls. The biggest ones were large enough that I could have easily stepped inside one if they’d been hollow. But my earth sorcery told me they were solid spheres of onyx.

I floated close to one of the smaller ones, and studied the runes engraved into it surface. Another circuit pattern, that glowed with a dull red light. There was a soul binding, and those were the hooks that tied the prisoner inside into the power tap enchantment. There were other spells too, all of them nasty work. Sharp spines to puncture the captive soul, and steadily drain off any magic it might have. A pain spell, tied to a maze of triggers designed to set it off in response to any escape attempt. Some kind of empathic spell, projecting a constant dull ache of despair. Hey, was that a communication function?

I touched the sphere with one gauntleted hand, and tentatively opened a link.

Burningdarklostalonesuffering.

I wrenched the link shut, gritting my teeth against the flood of horrible impressions.

Careful! Alanna said. You’re too young to swim in such madness, Daniel. If you must speak with the prisoners warn me first, that I may shield you.

“There’s no one left in there to talk to,” I said. “Just a bundle of mindless suffering. Fuck, this shit is evil. Why couldn’t they at least keep them in suspended animation when they aren’t needed?”

They meant to strike fear in the hearts of their enemies, Alanna said, as if eternal torture were a perfectly reasonable intimidation tactic. I fear these smaller orbs will be of no use to you. They would hold lesser spirits, or perhaps even mortal souls, and it has been far too long for them.

“What about gods?” I asked. “That’s what the big orbs are for, right?”

Them, and the Ancient Beasts. Their nature will make them more resilient, I suppose. But I still suggest a cautious approach. Such beings are a wily lot, and the prisons that bind their power may have missed a scrap here and there.

“Noted. What’s an Ancient Beast?”

You might call them animal gods. They arose from primal chaos in the time before words, and roamed among the beasts for countless ages before men arose to bring grander dreams to the world. The first gods hunted them sometimes, just as mortal men hunted the wolves and lions, but they were always dangerous prey. In the days of Atlantis there were still many of them lurking the wilder places of the world, destroying any who dared venture into their territories. Some were even worshiped by men, and gained the mystery of speech from them.

“Interesting. So the gods didn’t come along until there were humans?”

Ah, so this is another gap in your lore? Do you, perhaps, fail to comprehend the nature of gods?

“Aside from being powerful assholes? Not a clue. I take it you know where they come from?”

You’ve seen the primal chaos that lies between and beyond the Nine Worlds. A god is an eddy in that endless sea of potential, given form and life by some momentary touch of the Dreaming. Most of them remain trapped in the sea of chaos, blindly floundering in ignorance until they dissolve once more. But sometimes one of them finds some purchase on reality, and claws its way into the waking world.

“So their true form is just a blob of energy? No wonder they’re so hard to kill.”

Indeed. But despite their claims of eternal grandeur, in truth everything they are springs from the imagination of mortal minds. They have no power of invention, beyond the narrow roles conjured up by their worshipers. They can only find things to imitate, and before men arose there was nothing to copy but animals.

“What about the elves?”

Alanna chuckled. They like to put on airs as well, but their claims to antiquity are a lie. The faerie sprang from the dreams of men, and they had hardly ventured out of the Dreaming when I first learned to walk the world. It was another thousand years before they separated Faerie from the rest of the Dreamlands, and ages yet before the fair folk who lingered too long from their land began to change into elves.

“So humans are the elder race, huh? I have to say, Alanna, it’s really refreshing to be able to get straight answers about this kind of thing. Usually the people who know just talk in riddles, or look down their noses at you and refuse to explain anything. Only, it makes me wonder why I’m the one in charge here.”

Because my ancient wisdom has led me to know my limits, and understand the shape of my desires? Of the two of us, you are the bold revolutionary wielding the power of invention, while I am merely an excellent hunter with a sharp memory. Besides, am I not a passionate and attractive lover? Don’t I deserve to bask in the leadership and protection of a worthy mate? Surely it would be cruel to make me chart my own path instead.

I chuckled. “Far be it from me to argue, Alanna. Just remember that I’m always willing to listen, and don’t hesitate to speak up when you know something that I don’t. Which is pretty much all the time, I guess.”

Perhaps. But a henpecked man is a grumpy man, and makes a poor bedmate. Besides, if I step in to offer the answers of the past at every turn, who knows what wonders you will fail to invent? So I try to strike a balance, and only speak up when my words are needed. But know that I have no patience for riddles, and I care nothing for the pacts of secrecy created by bickering tyrants. You have but to ask, and I shall answer any question you care to pose as ably as I may.

“Thank you, Alanna. That means a lot to me. I suppose I’d better give you plenty of new and interesting things to experience, to keep things even.”

Oh, I shall be quite satisfied when I have walked upon Luna’s face, and all the seven planets besides, she replied airily.

“You’re not going to let me forget about the space travel thing, then?”

Indeed not! In truth, I am vexed that these foolish gods are going to delay the project with their needless wars. But I know these things take a great deal of time and effort, and we must see to our survival before we can seek greater wonders. So I shall school myself to patience, and await the proper moment.

In some ways it was refreshing to deal with someone so mature. In others it was a little intimidating. I didn’t even want to think about what kind of campaign of persuasion Alanna would put together if she decided I wasn’t going to follow through. A normal girl who wants something from you might just give you a blowjob before asking, and do a lot of pouting and nagging if you say no. Alanna was perfectly capable of organizing a hundred-year campaign of persuasion just to make sure she got her way, and God help me if it didn’t work.

Not that I was complaining. But I decided then and there that I’d better not ever mention the idea of other solar systems to Alanna. She’d expect me to invent a magical FTL drive just so she could explore the galaxy. Or worse, she might just decide that the travel time for sublight journeys was no big deal. After all, I was guesstimating her age at something like twenty thousand years. A century or two in transit was nothing compared to that.

But those were all thoughts for later. I turned my attention back to the obsidian orbs, and considered the situation. This was a risk, but there were no safe ways out of my current predicament.

Mara’s mission would cause a big distraction, and I might be able to use the chaos to escape if I set things up properly in advance. But I couldn’t help feeling like it was a suicide mission. Odin wasn’t stupid, and he knew about Mara’s powers by now. There was an awfully big risk that there was a trap waiting to catch her, and if they questioned Mara they’d find out all sorts of unfortunate secrets.

No, I needed another angle. Another distraction. An outside source of help, to give me the extra edge I needed to escape the trap I was in. And who better to provide it, than someone who was caught in an even worse trap?

The first of the larger orbs I tried held some being who had long since retreated into catatonia, and didn’t respond to anything I tried. The second held a mindless ball of rage, that threw itself at me with an incoherent roar the moment I established contact. I dropped the link in a hurry.

That was unpleasant, Alanna complained.

“Are you alright? That was some kind of psychic attack, wasn’t it?”

It was a bit bruising, but I am well enough. The prison restricts their power enough that such things won’t do me any real harm, so long as you close the connection quickly.

“Alright. Well, maybe the third time will be the charm.”

It wasn’t. But on the fourth try I found a presence that radiated an inhuman serenity. Was it meditating?

“Hello?” I said. “Can you hear me?”

The presence stirred. Have the hallucinations returned? Or is there truly someone there, after so long?

“Yes, I’m really here. I’m not an Atlantean, either. They lost the war, and the Sunspire has been abandoned ever since.”

I suspected as much. Is there any hope that I might persuade you to free me? I will gladly make any vow, submit to any binding, for a chance to escape this fate.

“I wasn’t planning to ask for anything extravagant. I’m Daniel the Black, by the way. A mortal wizard, or at least I started out mortal. Who are you?”

Me? I am only a ghost of a fool long forgotten. I thought myself so wise. I remember making wonders to awe the humans, and handing out advice cloaked in riddles. But the arts of beauty and cleverness availed me nothing in the end. The sword is mightier than any song.

Alanna stirred, and added her own voice to the conversation. If your old self is lost to obscurity, then pick a new self to embrace. I have seen divinities accomplish this before, and it seems a sovereign remedy to the ills of being forgotten. Simply see what you value most in the memories that remain to you, and be that. My wizard is a just man, and he will not leave an ally to languish in the dark.

Am I to be an ally, then? Not a slave? But your own troubles must be dire indeed, if you are reduced to seeking allies among the damned. The I shall take your advice, tree spirit. Call me Weaver.

Of tapestries, or plots? Alanna asked cautiously.

Why would I limit myself, when there are so many things that can be woven? Weaver replied innocently.

“Threads of cloth, threads of magic, threads of intrigue,” I commented. "Whatever kind of artful arrangement you’re talking about it’s all weaving, right?”

Magic? Oh! Oh, yes, I like that part. You’ve captured the soul of my meaning, and flown farther than my own thoughts can reach in this muddled state. But I like the lay of the land that your insight reveals. Such a clever, twisty way of seeing things. Think of me like that, Daniel, and I shall embrace the vision in whole. Or is this dusky beauty of magic and spiders some goddess of your people, who might take offense at an intrusion on her domain?

Oh, shit. Alanna wasn’t kidding about gods taking their forms from human imagination, was she? But why did this forgotten god have to pick that as an idea to copy?

“Ah, no, that’s just an idea some of our story tellers came up with. Only, characters like that are usually crazy villains that obsess over stupid, overly complicated schemes.”

I could hardly claim to be sane after so many ages of torment, Weaver pointed out calmly. Indeed, I hardly remember what sanity was, or how it might differ from madness. But if you free me from my prison I will swear to hold you as my closest ally, and whatever schemes I weave will bring no harm to you. Is that not good enough?

“Sure. I’m not foolish enough to try to tell deities what to do,” I said. “I’m just looking for prisoners who are interested in planning a jailbreak. It’s going to be a little complicated, because the spire is in the middle of a city full of gods right now, and I don’t have the power to open one of these prisons quietly. I can see ways to invoke enough raw destructive power to break the orb you’re in, and that should free you, but our captors will notice that right away.

Ah, so you seek to arrange a mass uprising, Weaver replied. That could work, if there are enough voices of reason to ride herd on the maddened mob. And afterwards?

“You do as you wish, if you can escape,” I said. “Although I can point you to a couple of goddesses who are looking for allies, if you’re interested.”

Perhaps. What can you tell me of the monsters who have left me to rot here for so many ages?

Alanna began to speak, outlining the rise of Asgard and the portfolios of its leading gods. I listened with half an ear, while I considered the situation. There were almost a hundred prisons here that held divine beings, and at this rate there might be a dozen or more who were lucid. Weakened as they were by their long imprisonment and lack of anchors, I didn’t think they had any hope of toppling Asgard. But a pack of Ancient Beasts rampaging through the city would be a hell of a distraction, and the more subtle prisoners could probably escape in the confusion.

A bunch of vengeful ancient deities would be quite a thorn in Odin’s side, and if some of them came out of things feeling well disposed towards me that was a bonus. Yes, this had potential.

Assuming I could figure out a way to survive blowing up the Sunspire.

Chapter 16

The heavy beat of magically enhanced drums filled the Slick Vixen as another serving girl guided me through the crowd. There were two elves dancing on the stage this evening, posing and touching each other suggestively as they worked their clothes off. But I wasn’t here for the show.

I was expecting to be led into the back room again, but instead the girl showed me to a booth in one corner of the main hall. Caspar sat there alone, staring at the stage and drinking. I slipped onto the bench at the other side of the table, and raised an eyebrow.

“Are the dancing girls corrupting you, Prince?”

“Hah! Bunch of fucking vampires, that’s what they are. They may look pretty, but don’t let that fool you. All they care about is your coin purse, and they’ll suck it dry in an instant.”

“Aw, don’t be like that, honey,” the serving girl said. “The stage girls might get a little mercenary, but its only because they have so many men chasing them. If they didn’t put a high price on their time they’d never get any peace.”

Caspar snorted. “Enough of that. Off with you, girl. Bring me another glass, and leave us to drink in peace.”

She pouted a little, but didn’t argue. “Yes, sir. Sir wizard, would you like anything?”

“A tankard of Black Gold,” I told her.

“Ugh, that dwarven sludge? Well, you’re the customer.”

She scurried away to fetch our drinks, and I turned my attention back to the former prince. He’d obviously been here drinking for a while, but he didn’t sound completely smashed.

“Drowning your sorrows?” I asked.

“I didn’t get my victory,” he grumbled.

“Hey, it’s not my fault the winter fey decided to crash the party. Did you ever find out what was up with that?”

“They were acting as advance scouts for the frost giants,” he explained sourly. “The passes to Jotunheim are full of troops now, and the damned faeries are guarding their columns against our raiders. The last briefing said there are a hundred thousand giants on our side of the mountains now, and Hel’s navy is massing off the coast.”

“Sounds grim,” I commented.

“Bah! A few giants are nothing. There’s already a plan to deal with them, I’m sure. But that’s where you come in. The last match was declared a draw, and I needed a win to keep my standing. Now my battlegroup has slipped down from the main body to skirmishing, and they’ll be sending us out to face the faeries soon.”

I shrugged. “Sucks to be you, but I don’t see what any of this has to do with me. I don’t have any pull with the generals.”

“Don’t be coy, wizard. I’ve seen the way you conjure up enchantments like a street vendor making hotcakes. Make me something to banish the glamours these faerie rely on, and I’ll consider us even.”

“I never owed you anything in the first place,” I reminded him. “I only agreed to help with the training battle because you were blackmailing me. But if you’re just going to keep coming back for more I don’t see that I have much incentive to go along with it. ”

“I asked for one thing, and you didn’t deliver,” he insisted. “Now I’m giving you a chance to fix it. Give me what I’m after this time, and we’ll be done with each other.”

“Until the next time you need something. Seems to me your threats are looking a little hollow now, anyway. Generals can be pretty hidebound at the best of times, you know. I have to wonder if they’d pay any attention to wild stories from some rookie commander with a low ranking, when they’ve got an invasion to stop.”

“Don’t test me on this, Daniel. Do you think that was the only arrow in my quiver? There’s no end to the trouble I could give you, and all I need to do is speak a few words in the right ear.”

“Are we down to schoolyard threats, then? I’m not your servant, Caspar.”

He glanced at something over my shoulder, and smirked. “I knew you’d take that tack. Consider this a demonstration, then. You have three days to deliver, or there will be more trouble to come.”

An enchanting female voice came from behind me. “Trouble? In my establishment? Then I’d better make sure I get in on it, no?”

I turned to look, and found myself staring.

She was tall, blonde and absolutely stunning. She had the same kind of curvy, buxom beauty as Avilla, an enticing mix of exotic perfection and earthy allure that was impossible to resist. But this woman somehow made even my beautiful hearth witch seem a little dowdy in comparison.

The way she was dressed probably had something to do with that, although ‘undressed’ might have been a more accurate way to put it. She wore a snug choker of dark metal that was sculpted into intricate knotwork designs, with a heavy ring attached to the front that announced it as a functional collar rather than simple jewelry. There were similar bands around her wrists and ankles, and the rest of her minimal attire continued the theme.

She wore open-topped shoes with high heels, but that was the only item I’d consider normal clothing. Her magnificent breasts were encased in a tight harness of leather straps that lifted and supported them, but left the hard peaks of her nipples exposed to the warm air of the club. More leather straps crisscrossed her body, winding around her limbs and creating a superficial impression of clothing without actually hiding anything. Even the little tuft of golden fur between her thighs was on full display.

She arched her back, presenting her breasts for my gaze, and took a deep breath. Her nipples swayed with the movement, mesmerizingly enticing, and I wondered what they would taste like.

A hard pinch from Alanna brought be back to my senses. I blinked, and checked my wards. But no, she wasn’t enchanting me. She was just that damned beautiful.

“You must be Aphrodite,” I managed.

Her smile was full of taunting mischief. “Yes, and you are the man who thinks to own me. Are you sure you can handle your prize once you’ve claimed me, Daniel?”

Handle her? Cerise would be all over that idea, but I already had alarm bells ringing.

“That was Odin’s idea,” I said. “He’s gotten tired of you causing trouble here, so he’s trying to find some fool to pawn you off on. I couldn’t exactly say no with Thor standing behind me fingering his hammer.”

“He does play with his little hammer a lot, doesn’t he?” She said lightly. “One wonders what poor Sif thinks of the habit. But where are your manners? You haven’t even offered me a seat.”

Caspar jumped to his feet. “Please, take mine, Exalted One.”

“Oh, all right. Run along then, princeling. This doesn’t concern you.”

Caspar bowed, and retreated. Aphrodite gestured, and a couple of elven serving girls appeared to quickly dust off the spot where he’d been sitting and carefully place a velvet cushion on the bench. The goddess put her arms behind her back, and her arm bands locked themselves together with a metallic click. Then she settled herself on the cushion with a sigh, and the servants scurried off.

“Ah, it’s nice to get off my feet,” she said.

“I’ve heard that high heels are a strain,” I replied. “But I’m surprised a goddess has to worry about such mundane problems.”

“Oh, but I’m hardly a goddess at all as long as I’m wearing this collar. My power has been suppressed for so long I can barely remember what it felt like to command the elements or bend hearts to my will. All I can do is stay eternally young and beautiful, and I have to obey any order the man wearing my control ring cares to give.”

“Is that why you’re sitting like that?” I asked.

She nodded. “I’m not allowed to feed myself. If I want to eat I have to be a good little slut, and convince my master to feed me. He has me sit like this so he can play with my tits while he eats. Then when he’s done I’m allowed to beg for my meal, like this.”

She leaned forward, making her breasts dangle and sway over the table. Her eyes gazed into mine, and went wide with longing. Her lips parted, and a pink tongue darted out to lick them.

“Master,” she crooned. “Your pet is so hungry for you. Please, master, may I worship your big cock with my mouth? I need you so bad. Please, just shove your dick all the way down my throat and fuck my filthy whore face. Beat me, choke me, pull my hair. I don’t care, just please, please let me taste your seed. I need it, Master. Your dirty slut is aching for your hot man juice.”

I realized my mouth had fallen open when she giggled, and her hungry, pleading expression suddenly changed back to a naughty grin.

“I can’t cover myself with clothes, either,” she went on, like she hadn’t just been putting on a performance worthy of a crack whore working for her fix. “For some reason Master thinks that will keep me in my room, where I won’t meet any other men. I can’t say no, you see, so any man I meet can have his way with me however he likes.”

“Seriously?” I choked.

“Yes. It’s so terrible,” she said breathlessly. “Just imagine, at any moment some huge, deadly warrior might just grab me by the throat and bend me over the nearest table. Or, there could be two of them, and they might not be satisfied to take turns.”

That image was hard to resist. But she was just trying to get to me, and if I got myself caught up in her schemes there was no telling what would happen to me. Women are at their most dangerous when they’re pretending to be helpless.

My coven binding made it a lot easier to keep my brain engaged, instead of getting sucked in by her aura of slutty sensuality. I couldn’t do anything with her no matter what I wanted, and the magic enforcing that rule made her charms a lot less effective than they otherwise might have been. So instead of taking the bait, I managed to gather my wits and make a halfway intelligent reply.

“As long as you’re fantasizing, why not three of them? What do they call that? Airtight?”

Alright, it wasn’t all that intelligent. But teasing her back seemed like a decent move, and her reaction confirmed the guess.

She giggled. “These grunting barbarians don’t have a word for that, dear. Why, they don’t even have proper names. My owner of the week always seems to be called Hnng or Urrg or Grmph, like their mothers were still in labor when they had to come up with a name. I can’t be bothered to keep track, so I just call them all Grunt.”

“I bet the elves get a laugh out of that.”

“I do try to be amusing,” she said. “A girl who gets given away to a new master every week learns to play to the crowd.”

“I suppose so. How does that work, anyway?”

“Oh, they strip me naked and put me in the stocks in the middle of Judgement Square,” she explained, with a frightened look on her face. “Can you imagine? Me, securely bound and bent over, exposed to anyone who wants to use me, in the middle of a public square? There’s always a crowd gathered to watch. Then my current master hangs my command ring on a hook above my head, and accepts challenges from anyone who wants to claim me from him.”

She lost the scared look, and shivered in excitement. “All those deadly gods of war used to fight over me every week. It was so exciting! Sometimes the bastards would even kill each other over me, and all I had to do was smile and wag my butt a little to egg them on. But the real gods of Asgard have long since given in to the nagging of their wives, and stopped coming. These days it’s just their servants and grandsons who fight over me, and no one ever manages to hold on to me for more than a week.”

She hesitated for a moment, and went on. “Of course, none of them are wizards.”

Oh, so that’s what she wanted.

“Pass,” I said.

She gave me an astonished look. “What? What do you mean, pass?”

“I’m not interested,” I told her. “I already have four wives, a grove of dryads, a couple of demigoddesses and enough hopeful maids, dark elves, wolf girls and wizardesses hanging around to fill an Emperor’s harem. My dance card is full.”

“But they aren’t me!” She spluttered. “Look at me! Have you ever seen breasts so round and full, or hair so long and rich? What woman could hope to compare?”

I chuckled. “You’re a Greek goddess, that’s for sure. Vain as fuck, and full of trouble.”

Her eyes flashed dangerously. “Do not provoke me, mortal!”

I leaned back in my seat, and casually took a drink from my tankard of beer. “Hey, you started it. Of course my girls can’t compare to you on looks, Aphrodite. But they also don’t have a thousand years of simmering hatred to work out. I’m not surprised to see you making fools of the Aesir after the way they’ve treated you, but can you really say you wouldn’t do the same to anyone else who holds your leash?”

“So the great Daniel Black is too cowardly to face a woman’s wiles?” She said scornfully.

I shrugged. “You’re not worth the trouble.”

Her face turned red, and for a moment I thought she was actually going to explode. But then the fire went out of her. She sagged, and looked down at the table.

“So you’re just going to leave me here?”

“Ah, so we’re switching to the damsel in distress act? Let me see if I’ve got this one right. You’re really just a helpless, innocent woman being abused by these horrible men, and getting back at them as best you can. But if some kind, selfless knight in shining armor were to ride in and gallantly rescue you from your chains you’d be oh, so very grateful. Why, you’d feed him secret information, and help him with his schemes, and no doubt you’d be so overcome by his saintly purity that you’d fall hopelessly in love and swear to be true to him forever.

“All of which will last until the poor fool manages to get those chains off of you, or until you decide he isn’t useful anymore. Then you destroy everything he cares about, and he dies in some poetically horrible fashion just after you break his heart one last time by letting him know that you’re responsible for it all. Probably at the hands of your next tool, who is convinced that he’s rescuing you from a terrible fate and you’ll be eternally grateful for his help.”

She huffed. “Well, at least you’re not stupid. It’s surprising what fools most wizards are.”

“Not really. Humans only have room for so much brainpower, so if a man is really good at one thing that usually comes at the expense of something else. Wizards are good at figuring out complicated abstract logic problems, but we usually give up a lot of social skills for that talent.”

“Apparently not always,” she said sourly.

“I’m cheating,” I told her. “Oh, and by the way, there are several different ways that I could free you if I thought it was a good idea. Assuming you actually want to be free, as opposed to just having a way to escape Asgard before everyone here dies.”

“Do you think Loki would kill me?” She scoffed. “The only thing I’m in danger of is a good ravishing.”

“Unless Gaea finds you first,” I pointed out. “Do you think she isn’t ready to get rid of a potential rival? She’s bringing some of the Great Beasts with her, too, and I bet they’re hungry after being locked in Tartarus for a few thousand years. But hey, if you want to take your chances that’s up to you. I’m sure you must have an exit plan all lined up by now.”

“As if I hadn’t thought of that long ago,” she scoffed. “But suppose I play along. What terrible price do you mean to demand for my freedom, wizard?”

I shook my head. “I’m not a Byzantine schemer like you, Aphrodite. I didn’t arrange to be shanghaied to Asgard, and I certainly had no idea you were going to be here tonight. I don’t have anything in particular in mind, and I’m not crazy about getting tangled up in your schemes either. But I’m not completely unsympathetic, so I’m letting you know the option is there if you decide you want to work something out. Just keep in mind that I’m not interested in getting knifed in the back, so I’m not going to make any deals with you unless I think you’re being at least halfway honest with me.”

We sat in silence for a few minutes, then. I sipped at my beer, and alternated between studying her and watching the dancers. There was a new act on stage, another pair of blonde beauties fondling each other as they danced. They looked alike enough to be sisters, although one seemed a bit older than the other. Their dance moves were amazing, and the whole act was as hot as anything I’d seen on the internet. But it was also crude and tasteless, not something I would have expected from elves.

I looked back to find that Aphrodite had followed my gaze, and was watching the performance with a smug little smile of cruel satisfaction on her lips.

“You want me to extend my trust to you,” she said slowly. “To bargain with you in good faith, and keep to my word as you keep to yours. Do you know what happened the last time I did that, Daniel?”

“No, that isn’t a story I’ve heard,” I said.

“It was just after Olympus fell. The gods of Asgard burned the homes of the Dodecatheon, and sated their lusts on our nymphs and vestal virgins. But victory, rape and pillage wasn’t enough for them. They held a farce of a trial where they held Loki responsible for the war, and sentenced him to be bound beneath the earth for all eternity. Then their lustful eyes fell on me, and they decided to take what I would not give freely in the guise of punishment.

“Freyr and Freyja objected, for they knew my only crime was letting a crafty god seduce me away from a husband I hated. But it would have cost them too much influence to stop the trial outright, so instead Freyja convinced me to play at contrition and throw myself on the mercy of the Aesir. She promised me that all I had to do was serve a short sentence, long enough for tempers to cool, and then she would see me released and give me a new home among the Vanir.”

She fell silent, watching the dancers. The younger one was half naked now, gyrating to the beat. The older one playfully chased her around the stage with a pair of nipple clamps in her hands, pretending to try to put them on her partner. Apparently the Vanir knew their kinks.

I used the moment to dredge up what I could remember about the deities she’d mentioned. Freyr was the leader of the Vanir if I remembered right, a god of war and virility. Freyja was his sister, a goddess of beauty and fertility. But unlike Aphrodite she was supposed to be a powerful war goddess too, and no one in Asgard wanted to be on her bad side.

“What happened?” I finally asked.

“After I was safely bound and collared Odin had me locked in the public stocks for six months, for any passing man or woman to use as they pleased. By the time that was over the goddesses of Asgard had nothing but scorn for me, and made no protest when he started loaning me out like a party favor. One day Freyja walked in on me with her brother. I hardly had a choice in the matter, but she grew furious with me for ‘corrupting’ him, and declared that she would gladly leave me in bondage forever as punishment.”

“Harsh,” I judged.

“She was jealous,” Aphrodite spat. “The two-faced bitch has lusted after her own brother since before Rome was founded, but she can’t even admit it to herself. She’s convinced that no woman is good enough to be his lover, and she hates me for having what she can’t.”

“Typical. But not exactly something you’d have to worry about with me. It’s not like I have a brother to lust after.”

“Too bad. But the story doesn’t end there, Daniel. Freyja was always so proud of her people, the Vanir. Especially the women, and even I can admit that there was much to be proud of. They were strong and beautiful, bold in battle and skilled in many crafts. But their rarest virtue was that they were bold and passionate in bed, yet virtuous and discriminating in the bestowal of their charms.”

On stage, the older elf had caught the younger one and attached the clips to her nipples. There were little weights hanging from them, and a slender golden chain that connected them both to a leash. Now the younger one kept pulling away in her dance, only for the older one to reel her back in with the leash.

I looked at the stage, turned back to Aphrodite, and raised an eyebrow.

Her smile reminded me of a shark. “Oh, yes, this is all my work. The sacred dances they once showed only to their beloved husbands, turned into a tawdry public display for any who care to watch. The artful sensual skills they once honed out of love, now being sold for a handful of silver. The maidens who once spent their youth weaving a fate of eternal love for themselves now compete daily to see who can become the most shameless slut. They scar their hearts with a thousand meaningless affairs, until the love their ancestors treasured is entirely beyond them.

“And look at their men! Do you see them leaping up to defend the honor of their women, and guard them from the eyes and groping paws of the humans they once despised? They wouldn’t dare. They’re like beaten dogs, begging for scraps of attention from women who won’t give them the time of day. They learn to make pretty clothes or play an instrument to be close to their women, only to watch them chase after the hairy human brutes who live for the art of war.”

She leaned closer, and lowered her voice conspiratorially. “They’ll never be able to compete, and it’s their own fault. Long ago the Vanir devised an enchantment that women can cast on themselves to make sure they get full satisfaction from a man, and another that lets them avoid unwanted pregnancies. But Maiden’s Delight makes a big cock feel so much better than an average one, and humans are much bigger than elves. All I had to do was convince them that they shouldn’t feel guilty about indulging themselves.”

I realized I was staring at her. “You set all of that up somehow?”

“I had a great deal of time to work,” she said, still sounding smug. “But don’t think me some abuser of the innocent. There was hardly a man in Alfheim who didn’t rape me when he had the chance, and the women who weren’t jealous only thought it was funny to see a foreign goddess brought so low. Well, look who’s laughing now. They wallow in their corruption, and thank me for the privilege of destroying themselves. There hasn’t been a child born in Alfheim in thirty years, and she may well have been the last. Right up there on stage, putting on a depraved show with her own mother.”

Aphrodite turned her gaze back to me, her eyes glittering with malice. “So don’t think that you can betray me and walk away, wizard. If I choose to bargain with you, and you wrong me, I shall do worse to you and yours.”

I took another sip of my drink in an effort to hide my nervousness. Note to self, Aphrodite is a fucking lunatic. Not that she didn’t have good reasons to be a little nuts, but once you go down the psycho road it tends to become a habit. If she got half a chance she might screw me over just because she’d gotten used to doing it, even if it hurt her own cause in the long run.

“Noted,” I said, as calmly as I could. “I expected as much, but you’ve made yourself clear. Now it’s my turn.”

I pulled out the Devouring Rod, and laid it on the table.

Aphrodite’s eyes went wide, and her skin turned white as a sheet. She cringed away from the enchanted weapon.

“Where did you get that?” She demanded.

“From Odin,” I told her. “I’m fixing it for him. And no, I’m not one of the men who made the Sunspire, whatever the Lightbringers may think. But I know their secrets.”

Her brow furrowed as she recovered from her shock, and the obvious questions began piling up. “Who are you?” She demanded.

“You can ask my patron that, when you meet her,” I said. “But that isn’t something to talk about here.”

I picked up the rod, and toyed with it as I spoke. Aphrodite’s nervousness returned in a hurry, and she stared at it like a mouse staring down a snake. It was still broken, of course, but she didn’t know that.

“I don’t have a long, interesting story like yours,” I said pleasantly. “Just a few boring little comments about my personal philosophy. You see, I’m basically a simple man. I just want to take care of my girls, build interesting enchantments, and be left alone. So it’s always a problem for me when I get caught up in the plots of some scheming mastermind who can engineer the downfall of a civilization with just a few words whispered in the right ears here and there.

“The obvious answer would be to just kill people like that right away, the moment I find out about them.”

Aphrodite flinched, and I could see beads of sweat breaking out on her forehead.

“But that would just make every schemer in the world my enemy, which isn’t a healthy situation to be in. So instead I’ve adopted a simple strategy I call tit for tat. As long as you seem to be dealing in good faith, and I don’t think you’re secretly working against me, I’ll be completely honest and straightforward with you. We can trade favors whenever the need arises, and walk away with a mutual benefit every time.

I put the rod down, and leaned forward to look her in the eye. “But the moment I catch you trying to screw me over, that’s it. I won’t mess around with asking for explanations, and give you a chance to weave some artful lie to convince me it was all a big mistake. I’ll just assume that if there’s one betrayal I spotted there were a hundred others I didn’t, and I now have a deadly enemy who is far too clever to take chances with. The only intelligent response in that situation is to strike as hard as you can as quickly as you can arrange it, and put an end to them before they realize that you’re on to them.”

She licked her lips. “Would you really use… that… on me, Daniel?”

“I showed you the rod to make it clear that I’m not making idle threats,” I told her. “I don’t approve of the things they were used for, and I’d prefer not to go down that road myself. But it isn’t my only option, if I ever find myself in that situation.”

I put the rod away. Aphrodite relaxed a little with the Atlantean weapon out of sight, but only a little.

“I see,” she said. “Well, it has been an interesting discussion, but I’m afraid my time is almost up. I’m liable to be missed if I remain here much longer, and it wouldn’t do to make my current master suspicious. Perhaps I’ll contact you again in a few days, when we’ve had a chance to consider matters.”

Chapter 17

I kept it together until I made it to Moon Ghost Hall, after a short flight across the city. But the moment I stepped through the door to my suite Alanna abandoned her wooden shape, leaving pieces of metal armor to clatter across the floor as she pulled me down into a fierce kiss. She was naked, bare breasts and thighs rubbing against my skin beneath the entangling embrace of my tabard, and her lips were hot against mine. I turned and pressed her against the inside of the door, slamming it shut before hiking her up so I could feast on her breasts.

“Yes!” She groaned, arching her back to press herself against me. “I need you in me, Daniel.”

Her hands fumbled with my clothes, pulling of the cloak and tabard that were haphazardly draped over us both. I was just glad I didn’t have to do that myself, because after sitting across the table from Aphrodite for so long I was having trouble focusing on anything besides the need to bury myself somewhere warm and inviting. I squeezed Alanna’s firm ass, and mauled her breasts.

“Hey, guys. How did it… whoa! Someone’s horny today.”

Oh, shit. I’d forgotten all about Mara.

“Negotiations with… ah! With Aphrodite,” Alanna explained.

Then again, did I care? Alanna had finally gotten my shirt off, and tossed it aside. I turned us around, and carried her to the couch.

“Holy shit! You met Aphrodite? Is she as hot as they say? I guess so, ‘cause you both look ready to pop and you haven’t even done anything yet.”

“She’s a magnificent bitch, as always,” Alanna said. “But my wizard put her in her place. You should have seen it, Mara. She tried to wrap him around her finger like she does with all the men, but he just rode roughshod over all her scheming. Then he pulled out the rod, and told her to behave or he’d deal with her! I almost came.”

Mara laughed. “Sounds like an exciting conversation. How did she take it?”

“She left the cushion soaked with her excitement,” Alanna said smugly. “Oh! I just remembered. Come here, and help me with these stupid pants. You asked me to show you how to suck cock alongside another woman, and Daniel deserves a special reward.”

Mara licked her lips. “Sure, I’m up for that. Is this just for topping the grand bitch, or is there more?”

“He refused the lure of her body, saying he would rather have us instead.”

“Oh, shit! You picked us over Aphrodite? Are you nuts?” Mara knelt beside Alanna, and the two supernatural beauties hurriedly dragged my pants off.

“You do realize you’re demonstrating why it was the right decision, here?” I said.

“You’re damned right we are!” Mara shot back. “How do we do this, Alanna?”

“We’ll start with the show,” the elder dryad told her. “We each take a side, starting right behind the head here, and wrap your mouth around it as best you can. Stick your tongue out to fondle the underside, and look into my eyes. It will be like we’re kissing each other around his cock.”

“Got it!”

They put on a hell of a show, kissing and licking my tool from both sides while they stared into each other’s eyes and rubbed their breasts together. Then Alanna slyly started fingering Mara with the hand she wasn’t using to steady herself. The sultry redhead’s eyes glazed over with lust, and she started making needy little whimpering sounds in the back of her throat. I had to cheat a little to hold back from going off too early.

When she felt the magic Alanna pulled away to pout up at me. “Stop that! There’s no need to impress us with your manly control, my wizard. Let yourself go, and shower us with your approval. We both know it won’t be the end of this evening.”

Her nimble fingers didn’t stop their work, and Mara was clearly too distracted to notice something as irrelevant as speech. She paused for a moment when Mara broke off their joint performance, and then lunged to gobble down my dick.

“Oh, shit!” I groaned.

Mara’s blowjobs were hot and sloppy, and the way she hungrily tried to swallow me I knew she was already on the edge. Alanna leaned into her side, and growled encouraging orders into her ear.

“That’s it, slut. Show your man how much you want it. Make him give it to you. Suck the seed right out of his balls.”

Mara growled in horny desperation, and deep throated me. Alanna shot me a smug grin, and dived down to suck my balls into her mouth.

I didn’t last long after that. But Alana and I were way too horny to be satisfied with one round, and Mara was on fire. One thing led naturally to another, until an hour or two later we were all lying on the bed in a tangle of limbs.

I laid there for a while, letting the soreness and fatigue fade away. Sex with Mara was always exhausting, and it would have been great to just go to sleep early. But if I wanted to survive to enjoy this crazy life I’d stumbled into I had work to do. So instead I gently disentangled myself, and got up.

One of the twins had left a basin and washcloth, so I cleaned myself up and threw on a robe before padding into the workshop. There my most recent creation was working away, laboriously embedding high-energy enchantments into a heavy band of gold. I checked that first, verifying that the spells were setting cleanly and the factory enchantment was holding up to the load.

The first time I’d build something like this it had been a finicky machine that needed constant repairs to keep working, but I’d finally figured out how to do better than that. My mistake had been trying to go too fast, throwing together a quick and dirty factory spell and then expecting it to stamp out enchantments more powerful than it was like they were cheap plastic toys.

This new machine had taken longer to make, and it ran a whole lot slower. It took an hour just to conjure the receptacle for the enchantment, a thin band of gold a couple of inches across with a sheath of tungsten protecting its sides and outer face. Then it carefully inscribed the enchantments, repeated the difficult parts over and over for hours until they were as strong as my magic could make them. All in all, it took a good four hours to make each ring. A pretty big investment, for a magic item that didn’t even do anything useful on its own.

What made the whole exercise worthwhile was the device that was going to house them. I took the band that had been finished while I was out, and carefully slotted it into the cylindrical housing I’d made for it. The test rig was about the size of a large pistol, with room for eight bands in its stubby barrel. At the back of the barrel there was a flat base plate, with a disk of gold bearing a different set of enchantments mounted in the middle of it. But unlike my first attempt at a magical gun there was no physical trigger, just an intent control interface.

There was a whisper of sound behind me. I whirled, suddenly remembering that I wasn’t carrying Grinder. But it was only Mara, standing at the door in all her naked glory.

“What are you doing up?” She grumbled. “I tried to hug you, and you weren’t there.”

“I’ve still got work to do if I’m going to be ready,” I told her. “Go ahead and sleep if you want. I’ll be along in a few hours.”

“It’s not the same if you aren’t there. What is that thing, anyway? I was looking at it earlier, but I couldn’t figure out what it’s supposed to do.”

There’s something really adorable about a tough girl looking all grumpy because she wants to be held, and doesn’t want to admit it. I opened my arms, and she stared at me suspiciously for a moment before slinking across the room to me. But when I hugged her she laid her head against my chest, and made a happy little sound.

“Better?” I asked.

“I think you ensorcelled me,” she mumbled. “I’m a fierce monster bitch. I’m not supposed to be all touchy-feely.”

“Yeah, well, I’m a scary dark wizard, and I seem to have the same problem. You’re just too sexy.”

“Goof. Don’t think you’re going to distract me with mushy stuff. What does this thing do?”

“Hmm. Promise you won’t explain it to anyone? I still don’t know who all is going to end up trying to kill me by the time Ragnarok is over.”

“As long as you don’t think I’m going to be on the list,” she said. “If dad sent me after you I’d just tie you up and carry you back to my room. Maybe keep you chained to my bed, so I can have that big dick whenever I want.”

I chuckled. “How terrible. Better watch out, though. Turnabout is fair play, and I’ve got plenty of help. Tying you up might not work, but Avilla will get you addicted to magically good cooking.”

“I think I can live with that kind of danger,” she said dryly. “Alright, Daniel. I’ll promise. As long as you’re not personally trying to kill my dad or his side of the family, I won’t tell anyone what I know about your magic. Good enough?”

“Sure. Alright, see the conjuration spells on the base plate?”

“Yeah, I got that far. It makes water, right? It looks like it’ll just keep making more for as long as you leave it turned on, so I guess it would be good for putting out fires. But how do you make a real weapon out of that?”

“That’s where the rings come in,” I told her. “This is a composite item, like most of the Atlantean enchantments I’ve been studying. The barrel carries commands to the rings from the intent control interface, and it’s reinforced to hold them in place and protect them from damage. Each ring has a spell on it that grabs anything passing through the middle and throws it down the barrel, while also concentrating it into a narrow jet instead of letting it spread out.”

Mara studied the ring I was holding up with a thoughtful frown.

“Okay, I think I can see that part. It still seems pretty wimpy, though, and what’s all that other stuff?”

“That’s one of the neat tricks I learned from studying Atlantean magic. Normally it takes at least a few seconds to cast a good attack spell, because it takes that long to spin together a useful effect and attach it to something you can throw. So something like a staff or wand is limited to a pretty low rate of fire, right?”

“Mostly,” she agreed. “There’s ways around that, like casting the spells in advance so you just have to tell them what to kill. But then you end up with a bunch of lighting balls or poison mist or something following you around, and sooner or later you’ll blow up something you didn’t mean to.”

“Exactly. Well, the Atlanteans had this interesting technique where you make a permanent enchantment that can grow when you feed it mana, and design it so that breaking the object it’s attached to just separates the enchantment into pieces without destroying it. So they could put some massively complicated imprisonment spell on a piece of crystal buried inside a rod, and when you want to catch someone it just expands the enchantment through the air to wrap around the target.”

“Whoa. That’s pretty slick. Making an enchantment grow that fast would take crazy huge amounts of power, but I guess that’s not a problem for you. Only, I don’t see how you’d keep it stable. There’s no way you can make it so the magic always gets broken along a spell boundary, and a spell that breaks in the middle is going to unravel in a few minutes.”

“It’s a pretty involved technique,” I told her. “You’re right, the only part that’s completely stable is the core of the enchantment, which is on an enchanted crystal inside the rod. The rest of it is like thousands of tiny little bubbles of magic that stick to each other, and they’ll gradually evaporate if you leave them alone. Only, if you’re doing this with battle magic, how long do you really need it to last? Most fights are over in a few minutes, and it’s easy to make things last that long. A lot of effects will stay stable for hours if you structure the spells right, and you can always re-cast them if you need to.”

“If you say so, Daniel. That’s getting out of my league when it comes to fiddly wizard magic. So, you’re using the water jet to carry attack spells? That makes more sense. Hey, is that some kind of acid spell?”

“Yep. Well, the important parts are the ward that protects the jet from other people’s magic, and the field of force magic that holds it together while it travels through the air. One ring will get the jet moving about as fast as an arrow, and this test rig holds eight of them. I’m pretty sure that’s going to give me a jet that will cut through stone, let alone people. But yeah, if I want to be thorough I can also turn the water into a magical acid.”

“Nasty. Well, that’s completely different from your usual magic, so I guess you’ve got a good disguise going. At this rate we’re going to be done and out of here soon.”

I frowned. “Maybe. We’re making progress, but this plan still has way too many holes in it. I really want more information about the defenses around your brother before we try anything. The Allfather has known for centuries that your father would have to get in there and free him somehow before he attacks Asgard, so there’s got to be some kind of trap. But I can’t think of a good way to find out more without setting it off.”

“Aphrodite would know,” Mara pointed out. “She’s a nosy bitch, and I think she was here when they build that giant dome over him.”

“Yeah, and what’s she going to do if I ask her about something like that? Best case, she makes me jump through hoops to get the information and then loses all respect for me when I do it. Worst case she tells Odin I was asking, just so she can enjoy watching me cope with the fallout. Either way I’m fucked, and not in a good way.”

“You really don’t trust her, do you? I still can’t believe you turned her down.”

“I’ll stick with women who aren’t completely insane,” I replied, giving her a friendly squeeze. She giggled, and groped me back. But then her expression turned unexpectedly serious.

“Daniel, what are we?” She asked.

Ah, shit. How did we drift into relationship talk?

“What do you want to be?” I replied.

“I don’t know. I mean, shit, you turned down Aphrodite but you want me? I don’t get it. I really don’t. What do I have that she doesn’t?”

“A heart,” I said.

She flinched. “What are you talking about?”

“When we first met you were on an undercover mission with your whole life riding on the outcome, but you still found time to befriend Elin and try to help her.”

Mara looked away. “I shouldn’t have gotten involved. She’s such a prickly, uptight bitch, it’s not like she was going to let me do anything for her anyway. It’s just, she got such a raw deal, but she kept soldiering on anyway. She deserved better, and I’m glad she finally got it. You’re taking good care of her, right?”

“The best,” I assured her. “But see, that’s what I meant. You can care about other people, when you think they’re worth it. You can have friends and lovers who aren’t just pawns on a chessboard, being manipulated as part of some twisted game. I don’t think Aphrodite can do that anymore. Maybe she was like that from the start, or maybe she’s just been hurt so much she can’t see past the pain anymore. But either way, anyone who gets close to her is just offering themselves up as a pawn for her latest scheme.”

“So you’re not going to try and fix her?”

I sighed. “That’s one of those typical male failings, you know? You see an attractive woman in a bad situation, and your instincts all say it’s time to saddle up your trusty steed and ride to the rescue like some kind of noble knight in a fairy tale. But in the real world there are people you can help, and people you can’t, and you have to know which are which.”

“Is that what I am, then? A little damsel you think you can help?”

“Hey, you’re the one who seduced me here, remember? I just didn’t say no when you decided to rip my pants off and jump on my dick.”

She swatted my chest playfully. “I never ripped your pants off, jerk! I was just making you eat me out, when you got so worked up you couldn’t take it anymore.”

“You have that effect on me,” I admitted. “What can I say, I have a thing for hot girls who can kick ass.”

“I guess that explains Cerise and Elin,” Mara said. “Even Avilla kind of has that fire in her eye, even if she can’t fight worth a damn. But what about Tina? That girl wouldn’t hurt a fly, and she’s dumb as a stump too.”

“A woman doesn’t have to be some kind of challenge to be interesting, Mara,” I said mildly. “Tina is a kind, sweet girl who just wants to be nice to everyone around her, and let them take care of her. You have no idea how relaxing that can be. When Cerise and I come home from yet another desperate battle for our lives Avilla and Tina are the ones who welcome us home, and remind us what we’re fighting for.”

“Huh. You know, sometimes I really wish I could have accepted your offer,” Mara said thoughtfully.

“It wouldn’t have worked anyway,” I said. “A coven bond isn’t just an expression of love. It’s also a binding, and there’s no way something like that could hold you.”

“I know. I guess I’m just stuck on the outside, looking in,” she said sourly.

“Do you really want in? You seem pretty independent to me, and you’re still young. Do you want to make a commitment that could last for hundreds of years, when you’ve barely started to live?”

“Maybe I don’t want to be all sensible and shit, Daniel. Maybe I’m tired of being alone. I know I’ll probably just fuck everything up, but when I see what you’ve got I’m too selfish not to want some for myself.”

“Then maybe you should visit sometime,” I said. “I suppose it would be less complicated if you wait until after Ragnarok, but you don’t have to. Just announce yourself to the guards instead of sneaking in, please. I’ve got a clan of dark elves running security for the island, and if they manage to spot you somehow things could get really messy.”

“They’d never suspect a thing,” Mara proclaimed. “But why would I do that? It’s not like anyone there wants to see me.”

“Now there’s where you’re wrong. Cerise still wants into your panties.”

She covered her face. “Ugh! I’m really not that into girls, you know? And don’t bring up earlier! That was about you, not Alanna. Even if she can melt my brain in ten seconds flat with those magic fingers of hers.”

“I know, I know. It’s fun, but it’s mostly something you do to wind up a guy. Or maybe if you had a really close friend who needed comforting or something, but even that would be more about friendship than romance. Right?”

“Um, yeah, I guess.”

“Well, I suppose you’ll have to decide how you feel about having someone with succubus powers seduce you into wanting her. I’ve never seen anyone completely reject Cerise before, so I’m not sure how she’d take it once she realizes you’re not just playing hard to get. But Tina is always happy to have a new friend, so all you have to do is be nice to her and she’ll be on your side. As for Elin, I think she has a lot of complicated feelings to work out, but when all is said and done I think she’d like to get to know you better.”

“Then why is she always such a prickly bitch?” Mara grumbled.

“Because she was ashamed of herself, and embarrassed about needing help, and she’s too proud to accept anything she thinks is being offered out of pity,” I explained. “But none of that applies anymore. She’s still kind of upset with you for trying to kill me, even if you weren’t trying very hard. But I think she’s also a bit ashamed of being so cold to you before.”

“So you think I still have a chance with her?”

“Yes. Just don’t be surprised if she ends up wanting to debate the ethics of your family’s military tactics.”

“Like they asked me for permission? Big sis is nice to me, but I have to admit she’s into some twisted shit. I notice you haven’t said anything about Avilla, though.”

“Avilla has hidden depths,” I said. “She’s sympathetic to your situation, but in some ways she’s the most calculating of us. She might not say it, but she’s the one who’s going to be weighing the benefit of a powerful ally against the threat of all your enemies. Or watching how you interact with everyone, and thinking about whether your friendship is bringing us closer together or just making life harder for everyone.”

“So she’s the head wife? Fuck. I was hoping it was Cerise, or maybe Elin. They’d be a lot easier to deal with. But why would miss perfect wife want someone like me around? I’d just screw up her perfect household with all my stupid problems, and take up time you could be spending with her.”

I scoffed. “Mara, if my coven was just four women trying to share one man I’d be up to my eyebrows in sly little plots and manipulation schemes by now, and we’d all be pretty miserable. Cerise and Avilla were in love with each other long before they met me, and the coven bond Cerise designed is equally strong between all the participants.”

“Wait, you mean they all… um, with each other?”

“I mean Avilla is more likely to get annoyed with you for taking up Cerise’s time than mine,” I said. “But Tina is always eager to step up, and she’s shared a few nights with Elin too. So making room for you wouldn’t be nearly as big a problem as you’re thinking. Besides, you don’t give yourself enough credit.”

“Maybe.” She pulled away, and shook her head. “That’s weird to think about. Elin too? I was sure she was straight. Though I guess that was stupid. She’s mostly faerie, and they don’t do straight. Hell, they think you’re hopelessly repressed if you stick to humanoids.”

“Elin is actually really shy,” I told her. “I’m not sure if the faerie depravity is a cultural thing, or if she’s just too young to have gotten like that.”

“Huh. It’s still weird to think about. You sure I can’t just lure you away with promises of power, and a chance to fuck a demigoddess every night?”

“If I was the kind of guy who’d abandon his family like that, would you even want me?”

She frowned. “Stop being so right, damn it. I’m supposed to storm off grumbling about how stubborn you are, not feel guilty for fucking a married man.”

I opened my mouth to reply but she interrupted. “No, stop, enough of that. I get it. I’ll think about it, okay? But not right now. You can stay up all night doing wizard shit if you want, but I need sleep.”

She turned to go, but when she opened the door there was no hallway on the other side. Instead there was only a yawning abyss of hungry darkness. A cold wind blew through the door, biting at my bare skin with teeth of ice. Something howled in the darkness, a weirdly harmonic sound like a chorus of mad pipers.

Mara slammed the door shut.

“What. The fuck. Was that?”

Something heavy thumped against the other side of the door. The heavy wood creaked ominously, and I was abruptly reminded of the fact that I’d left my equipment in the bedroom.

“I don’t know,” I said. I grabbed up the test rig, and hurriedly slotted the pieces together.

“I thought you and Alanna warded this place?” Mara demanded.

The whistling howl came again, from my left. The wall creaked, like something heavy was pressing against it, and there was an answering cry from the opposite direction.

“We did,” I said. “We must have missed something.”

I stepped to the window, and looked out. Where the training yard behind Moon Ghost hall should have been, there was only that gaping abyss of bottomless darkness.

“Yeah, no shit you missed something.” Mara moved to stand beside me, and peered out into the darkness. “The fuck? Did they teleport the whole room or something? But that doesn’t make sense, I would have felt it.”

There was a loud thump from below, and the floor creaked as something pressed up against it from below. I hurriedly threw an arm around Mara, and pulled her into the air.

“Give me something to stand on,” she said. “I’ll hold them off while you figure out how to get us back.”

“Good plan,” I agreed, and conjured a plane of force a couple of feet off the floor.

Mara dropped onto the force field, and shifted into her two-headed fox form. A puff of flame emerged from her left head, and she growled at the floor.

“Come on, fucker. I dare you. Let’s see how you burn.”

I called up my mana vision to try to figure out what was happening, but what I saw didn’t make any sense. There was a confused jumble of magic permeating the walls, but it didn’t form any spells that I could recognize.

A strange sizzling sound drew my attention to the corners of the room, where something dark and hungry that flickered like flames was eating its way in. It started to snake its way across the floor, like vines growing across a wall.

Mara turned to look, and her eyes went wide. “Black flames? Oh shit oh shit oh shit this is bad. Get us out of here, Daniel.”

Whatever that was couldn’t be natural, so I grabbed the rod off my workbench and threw a dispelling at it. But the magic just slid off the black flames, dissolving into a spray of broken fragments that almost looked like they were burning away. Then there was a loud creak from the ceiling, and the whole room tilted.

Mara looked around wildly, muttering to herself. “Fuck! What’s out there? What’s as big as a dragon and makes black flames? Think, bitch, there’s got to be something you can do.”

The right head of her fox form, which had been studying everything with narrowed eyes since her transformation, turned to me and spoke with a voice whose soft intensity was a striking contrast to Mara’s usual brash confidence.

“Daniel, call for Alanna.”

Was that Mara’s sister? Shit, she was right, Alanna wasn’t safe. I focused on our link, ignoring a renewed round of mad piping howls from all around the room.

“Alanna? Alanna, are you alright?”

Hmmm? Came her sleepy reply. Is something wrong, Daniel? You feel so distant.

“The Lightbringers are making another try, I think. Mara and I were in the workroom, then suddenly we’re surrounded by an abyss full of monsters or something.”

As I spoke a dark mass pressed up against the window, and the glass bent inwards like it was made of rubber. I backed away as it pushed further into the room, and Mara breathed a gout of white-hot flame that should have vaporized the glass and everything beyond. But instead the fire just melted the pseudopod of darkness into a pool of writhing liquid that glowed with an ominous violet light.

Oh, bother, Alanna said, sounding annoyed. You’ve been pulled into a nightmare realm, Daniel.

“A nightmare realm?” I repeated stupidly. “Great. What do we do about that?”

Just leave this to me, my wizard.

The black flames suddenly went out. Then a blinding light filled the darkness beyond the window. For a moment I saw a vision of brilliant sunlight and parched badlands, where a beast made of shadows howled in pain as it cowered away from the light. A thrown spear flashed down like a thunderbolt, impaling the thing’s bulbous body. In the blink of an eye the spear became a tree, its roots entangling each of the monster’s dozens of tentacles and burrowing deep into its body.

Then the vision was gone, and the room was normal again. No broken window, or molten glass monster. No flames or even scorch marks in the corners of the room. No nonsensical magic dancing around the edges of my vision. No sign at all that anything abnormal had happened.

The door opened. Mara and I both spun nervously to cover the entrance, but it was only Alanna.

“Stupid dream beasts,” she grumbled. “Not one in a thousand can feel fear, so they’re always troubling those they shouldn’t.”

Mara gaped at her. “That was a nightmare beast? Then was all of that just a dream? How did you get rid of it?”

“Why are you surprised? Silly girl, do you think even a well-fed nightmare can threaten a spirit who was ancient when the dreamlands were forged? Their kind holds no power over me. Now come to bed, both of you. I am weary of sleeping alone.”

She left without waiting for a response.

Mara reverted to human form, and stared after her. “Daniel, sometimes your familiar scares me."

“Me too, Mara. Remind me to never piss her off.”

Chapter 18

You might think that the prison of the Fenris wolf would be in hidden away in some secret location, protected by endless layers of misdirection. Or maybe buried in the middle of a giant fortress full of elite soldiers, surrounded by a moat of lava under a glowing dome of mystic wards.

Instead, the Vanir had planted a garden around it.

Oh, there were some defenses. A structure of dark stone the size of a football stadium dominated the center of the garden, hiding the bound monster, and its only entrance was an expanse of hammered steel that looked more like a bank vault than a door. There were two guards on duty outside, a massive redheaded man who had to be one of Thor’s sons and a dark-haired fellow who was probably another demigod.

But the park was in the middle of the city, and was apparently a favorite destination for young lovers. All we had to do was play the part, and we could wander among the carefully maintained flower gardens for as long as we liked. We spent the better part of an hour making a circuit of the park, strolling casually and pretending to look at the flowers. A small army of elven men was working in the hot sun, carefully tending the flower beds and eyeing the male visitors with poorly concealed envy.

After catching a few of those dirty looks myself I stopped under a shady oak tree, and kissed Mara until she was breathless and squirming in my arms.

“What was that about?” She gasped when I came up for air.

“I just felt like it,” I said. “But if you need an excuse, we’re building our cover.”

Behind her, a couple of gardeners who’d been shoveling fertilizer had paused to cast sulky looks my way. I reached under Mara’s short skirt to squeeze her bare ass, and met their gazes one by one. They hurriedly dropped their eyes, hunching in on themselves as they went back to work.

Mara giggled, and swatted my shoulder.

“Stop that, you lech. Or else I’m gonna jump you right here, and give all the elf girls an eyeful of what they’re missing out on.”

“That would be unfair to the poor girls,” I magnanimously conceded. “Alright, let’s see what’s over there.”

Impromptu makeout sessions were pretty common here, and several times we came across couple who were taking advantage of foliage and cleverly designed skirts to have outdoor sex without being too obvious about it. Usually it was an elven woman with a human male, although there were a fair number of lesbian couples here as well.

Only once did we encounter a male elf on a date, and he was obviously a special case. He radiated such an aura of sensual power that he had to be a demigod, and the two elf girls with him wore leather collars that they were obviously quite proud of. They made a point of teasing the gardeners, too, while the other Vanir women just ignored them completely.

They didn’t ignore me, though. Practically every elf we encountered in our stroll flirted with me, even though they weren’t alone. One of them was clearly trying to get the viking she was with to fight me, but he just gave her a smack on the butt to get her moving again and threw an apologetic glance my way. Some of the others were probably just trying to make their men jealous, but the first ‘lesbian’ couple we met acted like they were starving in the desert and I was a fresh steak. It took some real doing to convince them they weren’t going to seduce me, but Mara chased them off in the end.

Even from the outside, it was hard to miss the fact that Vanir society was profoundly fucked up. What did they do to those poor guys, to make them such cringing losers? Were all Vanir men like that now, or just the ones with public service jobs? I wasn’t sure I could even call them men, when they acted like little boys afraid of getting spanked.

Was Aphrodite really responsible? That would be pretty scary. But if her power was really bound it seemed a little far-fetched. Maybe the Vanir had already been headed into a decadent phase, and she’d given things a push here and there to encourage the worst possible outcome. That was more plausible than the idea that she could engineer a social revolution at will.

But just the same, I made a note never to let her get involved with a group I cared about. Just in case she wasn’t lying.

After finishing a circuit of the garden Mara and I retreated to an outdoor cafe a few blocks away, to consider our findings over lunch. The staff were all elves, and our waitress flirted with me shamelessly. The busboy looked on with the morose expression of a secret admirer getting his heart trampled for the thousandth time, when he wasn’t glaring daggers at my back.

“What is with these Vanir women?” I said after the waitress had left with our order. I was surprised to discover that the unwanted attention was actually getting a bit annoying. Maybe I was spoiled by the quality of my own women, but I wasn’t really interested in these vain, self-absorbed tramps.

“It’s your own fault, Daniel. Elves think magic is sexy, and you’re putting out more power than a whole circle of normal wizards. They just can’t help themselves.” She gave me a smug grin, and leaned back in her seat so she could run a bare foot up my thigh.

“Yeah, and you’re getting off on it,” I teased. “All those hot elf women following me around with their tongues hanging out, desperate to come up with some scheme to get into my pants. But you’re the one who gets to have me tonight.”

“Those fragile little girls couldn’t handle this beefy sausage,” she said, running her toes over my crotch. “All they could do is stare in awe while they watch you bone a real woman. Maybe play with themselves, and imagine being me.”

I chuckled. “Alright, that’s enough of that.” I caught her foot, and tickled her. She made an alarmed squeak, and pulled away so fast she’d have fallen out of her seat if I hadn’t caught her with force magic.

“Meanie,” she pouted.

“Business,” I reminded her. “We can play later. What do you think?”

I unfolded the wards I’d prepared earlier, protecting our conversation from eavesdroppers as well as I could manage. Alanna took that as her cue to do the same, although the magic she used all dealt with weird mystical bullshit involving the Dreamlands and nature. Mara saw what we were doing, and took a few moments to raise her own protections before answering.

“That should be good enough, as long as we don’t name any names. Okay, the door might seem impressive but it’s really a piece of cake. I can open it no problem. The guards looked pretty tough, though. I don’t think I can take them at all, let alone without letting them sound an alarm.”

“Yeah, they’re going to be a problem. I bet we could do it if we work together, but not without alerting the whole city.”

“Can’t you just magic us past them somehow?” She asked.

“The building is warded against all the obvious tricks,” I told her. “No turning the stone to mud, or banishing it, or stuff like that.”

“You could read the wards? How? I tried to look at that, but they’ve got some kind of anti-divination thing worked into them.”

“I’m a cheating cheater who cheats. The scryguard was hiding the wards from me too at first, but it couldn’t hide itself. So I used my mana sorcery to reverse-engineer how it works, and make an inverse filter to undo the blur effect. After that it was just a matter of figuring out what each layer does.”

“You suck,” she grumbled. “Wizards shouldn’t be allowed to have sorcery.”

“Said the sorceress who’s learning wizardry? Anyway, the wards are a giant maze of barriers against magical travel. Spells aren’t going to bypass them. The only option that might work is the teleportarium in the Spire, and I’m not too keen on trying it.”

“The what now?”

“Oh, didn’t I mention that? Apparently the Atlanteans used the Spire as a central base for their campaign to imprison all the powerful beings they could get their hands on. There’s a bunch of interesting facilities in there, even if most of them are wrecked. The teleportarium has a bunch of big platforms with an enchantment that can send people places, sort of like the Dark Portal. Only the teleport enchantment is a lot more brute-force, and not as flexible. It can’t send you to other worlds, and if it hits a serious ward you’re liable to come out with your body scrambled.”

Mara winced. “That sounds bad. Let’s call that a last resort, ‘cause I like all my body parts where they are. What else have you got?”

“Normally in this situation I’d go with overwhelming firepower. Build a weapon that can just blow those guys away with our first attack, and do this as a quick hit-and-run thing. But there’s no way they aren’t prepared for something like that. Best case, some emergency strike team of elite badasses drops in on us while you’re doing your thing, and the gods won’t be far behind. Worst case it’s all a trap for you, and he isn’t even in there.”

“He’s in there,” Mara insisted. “I can tell. Blood calls to blood, you know? Just like he’ll know who I am the minute he sees me. But mom told me about the prison they built around him, and it’s not just a big room. There’s supposed to be this enchanted maze full of traps and killer golems and stuff. It’s one of those places where everything shifts around when you’re not looking, too, so anyone who goes in gets lost and wanders around until they starve to death.”

“Can you find your way through it?”

She shrugged. “The path to the heart of a maze is a secret, right? We could get it done. But it might take a long time, so we can’t do it that way if we’ve set off alarms going in.”

I shook my head. “No, fuck that. This setup is just begging for a dungeon bypass. Matching wits with whoever designed the maze would be stupid, but your brother is way too tough to be bothered by a little collateral damage. So our best bet is to just blast a hole through the walls, dungeon and everything, and go straight in to get him.”

She giggled. “You’re not like most wizards, Daniel. A guy like Steelbinder or Ward would stroke is beard and try to plot out some tricky shit to out-think the defenses. I like your way better. But we’re going to need a hell of a distraction if we do it that way, because they’re not going to just sit around and watch while we bust out my brother. What could we possibly do that would look like a bigger problem to them?”

I considered that for a long moment. According to the prophecy of Ragnarok the Fenris wolf was supposed to kill Odin. The old bastard would pull out all the stops to keep that from happening. No doubt he’d have all kinds of contingencies for dealing with a breakout attempt, and they’d all be designed to stop gods. Mara and I were pretty tough, but I had no illusions about fighting our way out of a trap that was meant to catch Loki. The only way we had a chance at this was if Asgard was already in such chaos that the people responsible for the defenses were already busy.

Maybe it was time to bring Mara in on the results of my recent investigation

“You know,” I said casually, “the Spire has a self-destruct feature.”

“No way! Seriously? If everyone is so worried about this thing, why didn’t they ever use it?”

“Maybe they didn’t know? Not everyone has Alanna explaining things to them. But it probably has more to do with not wanting to free all the souls that are trapped in the machine. An explosion won’t damage souls, and a lot of giant monsters are mystical enough to just assume their physical form again once they’re free. Then they’d go on a rampage. There’s also the little issue of all the gods who’ve been trapped in there, slowing going more and more crazy for thousands of years.”

“Damn. That would be a hell of a distraction, alright.”

“It would get the job done,” I agreed. “Trouble is, it also blows up the Spire, and it doesn’t have a time delay. I’m pretty tough, but I don’t think I’d survive being at ground zero of a blast like that.”

That was an understatement. I wasn’t sure if we were talking kilotons or megatons, but we were definitely looking at the magical equivalent of a nuke here. I wanted to be miles away if it ever went up.

Mara chewed her lip thoughtfully. “That’s a problem. Although if you can figure something out, it would be a great way to fake your death. Especially if you leave a body behind. Can your flesh magic do that?”

“Make a fake body? Hmm. Sort of. I could cut off a finger and grow it into a copy of myself, or something like that. But it would take a few hours, and I don’t have a good way to store it for later. If I grow a whole body it’s going to be alive, like a baby in an adult body, and if I leave out the brain it’s going to die and start decaying. Besides, I’m not sure there would be anything left for people to examine.”

“There are spells for that,” Mara said. “Any god with a talent for tracking can stand in a crater and get clues about who died there, one way or another. But magic like your flesh sorcery is so rare, I bet you could fool them. Even if a piece of the body survives, if it was grown from the real you I don’t see how anyone could tell it was a fake.”

“Yeah, that’s a good idea. I’ll have to think about that some more, and see if I can figure out a way to make it work.”

Actually, that brought to mind a whole bunch of classic evil wizard schemes from modern fiction. Soul anchors, backup bodies, body hopping - there was a whole list of sneaky ways to cheat death and confuse your enemies there, and my studies of Atlantean magic had gotten me to within spitting distance of being able to do some of it. Pulling a soul out of its body without damaging it was a delicate process, and putting it into a new body was even harder. But the Atlanteans had apparently done that sort of thing sometimes, and the rod had all of the necessary enchantments.

Doing it to myself would be tricky, though. Disembodied mortal souls have a lot of trouble just staying awake and sane, let alone casting complex magic. I’d have to set it all up in advance, using magic items with some kind of automatic activation setup, and how would I ever test it? This was the sort of thing that called for a few months of really careful experiments with a group of volunteers. The pressure was starting to build up here, but I wasn’t that desperate yet. Was I?

A booming voice interrupted my musings.

“Daniel! Just the man I was looking for. How are you?”

I looked up to see Brand striding boldly across the patio towards me. Mara made a little squeak of alarm, and started chanting under her breath.

“I’m just a hall wench. I’m just a hall wench. I’m just a hall wench.”

Shit. There was no avoiding the man, so all I could do was try to help cover for her. I stood to shake the massive warrior demigod’s hand.

“Brand! Well met. I see you escaped Skogheim in the end.”

“With your help,” he agreed. “I owe you one for that. Ah, I see you’re having fun with the magic of the halls. Missing your favorite redhead already?”

“Maybe a little,” I admitted. “I’m still hoping for a chance to turn her, but I’ll admit that’s probably wishful thinking. She seems pretty attached to her father.”

Brand nodded, and stole a chair from one of the other tables so he could sit with us. Crap.

“It’s a classic gambit,” he said. “Her mother treats her like shit and gives her a terrible childhood so she’ll grow up craving affection, and then daddy gives her a few kind words and she’s ready to take on the world for him. Knowing Loki he’s probably fucking her by now.”

Mara blushed furiously, and looked down at her plate.

“I don’t know, he’s got to be pretty busy playing Sigyn and Gaea off against each other,” I replied. “More likely he’s just stringing her along with fantasies about being daddy’s good little girl.”

Good God, Mara’s blush was even brighter now. She really did have incest fantasies. Is there some cosmic rule that anyone with divine blood has to be completely fucked in the head? But I’d better get off this topic before Brand noticed.

“Maybe,” he conceded. “Who can say what will come out of his twisted mind? But if you have some plan for binding her to your will you’d best enact it quickly. She’s expendable, and one way or another they’re going to be expending her soon.”

“I’ll keep that in mind,” I said. “So, what kind of nasty surprise did you end up leaving for Gaea, anyway? Assuming you can tell me.”

He chuckled. “Let’s just say that her scheme to make death a minor inconvenience for her sons isn’t going to work out as well as she expects. What about you, though? Her endless army seems to be missing in action all of a sudden, and there was no one else there who could have done it. Have you made some new breakthrough in strategic curses?”

“Who, me? No, I just ran across a nasty piece of work from the ancient world a while back, and I figured Skogheim would make a good home for it. I doubt Gaea is enough of a scholar to figure out what she’s dealing with, so we can look forward to a year or two of all her andregi mysteriously dying before it gets used up. I couldn’t exactly stick around to watch, but I’m pretty sure most of the sleeping army is dead.”

“Hah! See, this is why I always say you shouldn’t underestimate a wizard. Most of them are limp-wristed scholars who fold under pressure, but when you find one who can fight there’s no telling how many aces he might have up his sleeve. You know, when I recounted your battle with Korak even the Allfather was impressed.”

“Oh? When was this?” I had a sudden suspicion about how I’d come to Odin’s attention.

“Just after my return,” he said. “Odin invited me to feast with his court to celebrate the mission, and of course everyone wanted to hear about it. Sif thinks you’re a cold bastard for leading Mara on, but Thor and Tyr had a good laugh about it.”

“Great. So now instead of finishing my citadel I’m stuck here while Loki’s armies encircle the city, and the Lightbringers take another shot at murdering me every few days.”

He rubbed his neck uncomfortably. “Yeah, well, sorry about that. I had no idea the Allfather had such urgent need of an Atlantean wizard But that’s actually why I wanted to talk to you. I feel like I screwed things up for you there. I talked you up some because I figured you’d enjoy a chance to smite some more evil, and maybe get a little divine support in case Kozalin attracts too much attention. I didn’t realize you’d have so many enemies looking for you.”

“If I wanted to march off to war I would have shown up here to volunteer,” I grumbled. “I had my reasons for building a citadel and saving a bunch of civilians instead.”

“Yes, I understand that. But dragging your feet now isn’t going to help anything. People are already starting to wonder why you’re taking so long, and you know how quickly tempers can turn hot when things are getting tight. If you want to get back to your citadel you’d best finish the job quickly.”

I raised an eyebrow at that. “Do you know what I’m working on for Odin?” I asked.

He nodded. “The Rod and Spire. It’s not common knowledge, but I’m privy to a few secrets.”

“Well, it’s not an easy job. The rod is already fixed, but it won’t do what he wants until I repair its connection to the Spire. Which means going into that lethal hell of broken magic, and trying to fix things without tripping any traps or accidentally freeing some Great Beast.”

He shifted uncomfortably. “That could happen?”

“Yes! Some idiot tried to free the prisoners by breaking things at random, and the whole prison mechanism is a mess. One false move and I could get sucked into it myself, or let something out by mistake. I’m making progress, but it’s going to take time to finish.”

He sighed heavily. “Time is a problem, Daniel. I believe you, but not everyone is convinced. Some people are wondering if you’re really on our side. There’s been some talk about persuasion methods, and I can’t stall them forever.”

“In other words, if I don’t produce something soon they’re going to threaten my girls?” I said tightly.

“It doesn’t need to come to that, Daniel. How much time do you need?”

I rubbed my forehead, and tried to think. How long would it actually take, if I decided to go ahead and finish the job?

“I’m not sure,” I admitted. “There’s a plasma vortex around the main spirit conduit’s control system that I haven’t managed to clear out yet, so I can’t tell how badly it’s damaged. Best case, there’s just some surface damage and I can have it fixed in about a week. Worst case it’s completely destroyed, and I have to improvise a replacement. That could take months.”

He shook his head. “I can’t stall them for months, Daniel. You’ve got a week, maybe two at the outside. I don’t want to see that cute witch of yours impaled at the Plaza of Justice, or Elin and Avilla in the public use stocks. But it’s not up to me. Dad’s not in a mood to wait and see right now, and neither is Odin.”

I clenched my fists under the table. “Message received, Brand.”

“Hey, I’m on your side here, Daniel. Look, I figured you might just be holding out for a better reward, and I managed to arrange something that might help you out here. This plasma stuff that’s in your way, that’s like fire only more so, right?”

“Yes.”

“Well, it’s not common knowledge, but Aphrodite has a water aspect. Something about being born from the sea foam, I guess. So take this.”

He fished around in his belt pouch, and came up with a ruby that was big enough to make me wonder whether it was real. The gem was heavily enchanted, in the intricate but remorselessly regular style I was coming to recognize as dwarven work.

“What’s this?” I asked.

“The key to Aphrodite’s chains. We usually keep her completely locked down, because she’s such a treacherous bitch that if you give her the slightest bit of power to work with she’ll find some way to cause trouble with it. But the next challenge match for her leash is in a couple of hours, and we both know you can win it if you want. So show up, take control of the bitch, and then put that gem in the socket on her control ring. That will let you loosen her restrictions, so she can use her divine powers at your command. Just don’t forget to lock her down again after she puts out this ever-burning fire for you.”

“I’ve talked to Aphrodite,” I said. “Loosening her restrictions sounds like a short road to getting charmed into being her slave.”

He chuckled. “That’s why I’m not worried about giving you the gem early, Daniel. You understand what you’re dealing with here. But her bonds aren’t that easy to get out of. The ring will reflect any mind whammy she tries on you back at her, and the collar makes her give you honest answers if you’re wearing the ring. So she can’t control you, and you can just make her tell you about her schemes. But her mind is such a snake pit that keeping up with everything she’s trying to do behind your back will keep you busy all day long, and you don’t have time for that. Better to just chain her to the bed and ignore her when you’re not using her.”

I shook my head. “What the hell does Odin think I’m going to do with her, anyway?”

Brand shrugged. “Bind her in your basement and bleed her for power? Sell her to some Abyssal lord for power and favors? Sire a clan of demigods on her? Who can guess what a wizard would do for power? But there’s a full measure of divine might locked away in her soul, and as a woman she’s the ultimate challenge. I’m sure you’ll find some use for her.”

I took the ruby. It was warm in my hand, pulsing with a heavy power that made my own enchantments look like toys in comparison.

“Yeah,” I said quietly. “I can think of a few uses for her.”

An ally against this city of callous evil? Alanna suggested silently.

I’ll never be able to trust her, I replied. But she has a lot more reasons to hate them than me. I’d rather just stay the hell away from her, but it looks like I don’t have that luxury.

Brand clapped me on the shoulder. “Good! I knew you’d be reasonable about this. So, you’ll be giving Gustav a delivery date tomorrow?”

“Yes.”

“Then I’ll leave you to your work. Oh, and let me know if you decide to make a serious move on that business with Mara. The dwarves who made Aphrodite’s bonds are still in business, and I can get you a discount. Trust me, no matter what her aspects are they can think of a dozen ways to bind her.”

“That’s not something I usually do to people I like,” I told him.

He shrugged. “It’s the only way the gods are going to leave her alive, Daniel. Even then you’ll need favors to call in, so be sure you earn some while you have the chance.”

Mara glowered at his back as he left, but she stayed silent until he was halfway down the block. Then she turned her sullen glare on me.

“You say one word to those dwarves and we’re through.”

“You know me better than that, Mara,” I growled.

“I’ve been wrong about people before, Daniel. I’m just saying, there’s a line, and that’s way over it. Some of your girls would get off on playing around with shit like that, but I’m not gonna live my life on anyone’s leash.”

“Not even Loki’s?”

“Don’t go there. Did I give you shit about getting worked up over Aphrodite?”

I took a deep breath, and tried to reign in my temper. She wasn’t the one I was pissed off at, and I couldn’t afford to lose any allies here.

“Sorry,” I managed. “You’re right. It’s not my business, anyway.”

She dropped her gaze, and played aimlessly with her food. “It kinda is, if we’re going to get serious. But that can wait. Dad still has people in Kozalin. I could send word, and get Elin and the others out of there. We’ve got places where we could hide them.”

“Then what? I’ll just end up with a different group of gods holding them hostage, and don’t tell me your father wouldn’t do it if he thought it would help him get his revenge. I’d just be trading Brand’s help for yours, assuming he isn’t just playing good cop.”

“I’ve got a lot more pull with my family than he does with the Aesir,” Mara countered.

“So if your mother decides to do something spiteful to them, you can stop her?” I said.

Mara was silent.

“That’s what I thought.”

“Well, what are you going to do, then?” Mara demanded.

I closed my hand over the gem, and felt the magic pulsing through it. “What I have to.”

She eyed me warily. “You aren’t really going to deliver, are you? Daniel, they’ll never let you go if you do. They’ll make you keep working on the Spire while they use it to win the war, and then laugh when the Lightbringers finally get you.”

“I know, Mara. In the long run there’s only one way out of this that doesn’t end with me in chains, but it isn’t going to be pretty. I’m still going to help you with your problems, but I’m going to need you to help me with mine. Can I count on you?”

“I’ve got your back, Daniel,” she said firmly. “But what are you going to do?”

“I’m going to make you look really badass for a few months, until whoever is still alive figures out what really happened. Then they’re going to look back at this shitstorm, and decide that messing with me is not worth the pain. Now come on, we’ve got a fight to get ready for.”

Chapter 19

The weekly brawl for possession of Aphrodite’s leash was a popular event. Judgement Square was packed with a teeming throng of men and elves, all gathered to watch the duels. There were no children in the crowd, but aside from that detail it reminded me of any sporting event I’d ever been to. There were even vendors moving through the crowd hawking snacks and drinks, and a couple of booths where bookies were taking bets.

A broad wooden stage dominated the center of the square, and in the middle of that were the stocks Aphrodite had mentioned. We arrived just as she was bending over to put her wrists and neck in the round hollows of the device’s lower half. A guard lowered the top half into place, leaving her trapped with her head sticking out one side of the heavy wooden board and her naked body on the other side.

Come to think of it, half the crowd was probably here just to see her naked. Even from a distance her beauty was stunning, and the way she swayed and wagged her butt was guarantee to draw in more contestants.

The guards attached the shackles on her ankles to heavy chains anchored to the stage, and then backed away. An armored warrior who must have been seven feet tall reluctantly took off the ring he was wearing, and hung it from a hook on the front of the stocks right above Aphrodite’s head. Then he turned to face the crowd with a determined scowl, one hand resting on the massive axe hung from a loop on his belt.

A dwarf with gleaming gold bands on his tusks stepped up onto the stage, and raised his hands.

“Warriors and wenches, welcome to this week’s Battle for Beauty’s Leash!”

A cheer went up from the crowd. The dwarf waited for the noise to die down before he went on, his deep voice booming across the plaza.

“That’s right, everyone. We’ve got the hottest slut in Asgard right here for your viewing pleasure. Shake that ass, slut! Are you ready for a new master?”

“New master, old master, what do I care?” Aphrodite called out, her sultry tones somehow penetrating the general din to caress my ears. “I haven’t been fucked in hours, and my pussy is getting desperate for a big cock. Come on, studs, are you ready to show me who’s boss? If you want a piece of this sweet ass, come up here and take it!”

“There you have it, folks! Right from the grand slut herself. Gorash, are you going to let some young punk take that sweet pussy away from you?”

“Hell, no!” The giant warrior shouted. “Come and try me, boys. I’ll kill any man who steps on stage!”

“We’ll see about that,” the announcer called. “The rules are the same as always, warriors. One challenger at a time, and once you step onto the stage there’s no backing out. Keep your power focused, because if you destroy the stage or kill anyone in the crowd you’re disqualified. But other than that, anything goes, and the first man to win ten challenges in a row gets those sweet tits all to himself for a week. Step on up, warriors! Who’s ready to try his luck?”

There was a group of men gathered around the steps, but no one seemed especially eager to go first. That was sensible enough. The fight would be easier if they let someone else wear Gorash down first, and maybe eliminate some of their rivals.

“How are you going to do this?” Mara asked. “These guys are the best fighters Valhalla has to offer, and with those rules you can’t use most of your magic. You’re not all that good with a sword, are you?”

“Who said I was going to be fighting?” I replied. “That would be stupid. Alanna, are you up for this?”

The wooden armor I wore shifted and shrank, fading away in the blink of an eye as Alanna stepped out of it. She wore an odd suit of light armor that reminded me a bit of the style the ancient Greeks had used. Supple leather covered her torso, with a steel breastplate protecting her chest and a skirt of leather strips faced with steel hanging down over her thighs. Steel bracers protected her forearms, and an open-faced helm covered most of her head, but her legs and feet were completely bare.

“I am ready, Daniel,” she said confidently. “Shall I eke out a narrow victory against the odds, or would you like to make a statement?”

Mara stared at her. “You’re sending Alanna to fight? Are you sure that’s a good idea? Half those guys are going to think it’s an insult, and they’ll take it out on her.”

Alanna patted her cheek. “Sweet girl, you need have no fear for my fate. Have you forgotten who I am?”

“I want you to smack them down pretty hard,” I said. “We can’t afford to have a bunch of sore losers following us around making trouble, so I want them to know they’ve been beaten.”

“Then fill me with your power, my wizard, and I shall crush every foe who stands against me,” Alanna said confidently.

I focused on our bond, and sent a rush of mana flowing down it to join the ocean of power she already held. Her mana capacity was absurdly huge by now, and still growing fast enough that I suspected she’d built some kind of storage device in her private pocket dimension. But I wasn’t going to run out, so I didn’t mind feeding her all the power she could want.

She shivered, and her eyes lidded. “Wonderful,” she breathed. “That’s my wizard. Always ready to drown me in his essence. Cheer me on, then, while I work your will. This should be entertaining.”

She swaggered off into the crowd, projecting an aura of bad girl confidence so thick you could cut it with a knife. Mara watched her go with a worried frown.

“I hope you know what you’re doing here, Daniel. Asgard’s heroes are bad news. Most of those guys are as tough as demigods by now, and they’ve been training to fight Loki’s army for hundreds of years.”

“That’s why I’m not going up there,” I said. “You’re right, the only way I can fight that kind of skill is if I make it irrelevant by blowing up the whole area. But that cuts both ways. Tell me something. How long do you think Alanna has been training to fight?”

“I know she’s old, Daniel. But she doesn’t even have a sword!”

I shrugged. “She’s older than swords, Mara. Metalworking has only existed for, what, maybe a fourth of her life? Hell, she probably remembers when spears were the big new thing. Trust her to know the best weapon for a fight.”

“A fourth? No, she can’t be that old, can she?”

Some overconfident kid had gone up to fight Gorash and gotten his ass kicked while we were talking, which made me glad we hadn’t waited any longer to make our move. A couple of armored dwarves dragged the body off the stage, and the announcer stepped back up.

“That’s one victory for Gorash! Who will be next?”

Alanna leaped over the whole crowd of warriors that was gathered at the foot of the steps, and landed lightly on the stage.

“I shall do battle next,” she announced boldly.

There was a moment of stunned silence, before the crowd erupted in astonished murmurs.

“A woman?” Gorash growled. “Is this some kind of joke? You aren’t even armed!”

“Do you fear me so much, that you make foolish excuses? I am never unarmed.”

Alanna held out her hand, and a spear of living wood grew from her palm to fill it. Little leaves sprouted from the shaft here and there, but the tip was steel.

“Is she a dryad?” Someone said.

“No, it must be a magic spear,” another objected. “No dryad can shape metal.”

“Who are you, stranger?” The announcer asked.

“I am-”

“Alanna Firescorn!” Aphrodite exclaimed. “I thought you died in the Fall!”

“I am not so easily disposed of.”

Aphrodite laughed. “That’s just like you, Daughter of Spring. But what are you doing in Asgard?”

“You don’t think I came just to see the magnificent bitch in chains? Perhaps I want payback, for what you did to Pythagoras.”

“Are you still upset about that? Well, come on, then. Cut a bloody path through these grunting savages, and we’ll see if you can tame me.”

“All challengers are welcome,” the announcer declared. “Man or woman, centaur or giant, it makes no difference under the Allfather’s decree. Take your places, warriors. Ready? Begin!”

Gorash unlimbered his axe, and charged Alanna with a war cry that shook the stage. But the ancient dryad wasn’t intimidated at all. She met his rush squarely, stepping into his swing and stopping it cold with her hand on the shaft of the axe. The tip of her spear flashed up to lay his unguarded throat open, and a fountain of blood erupted to shower the stage.

Gorash staggered back two steps, and collapsed. Alanna twirled her spear and turned back to the announcer, not a hair out of place. The blood hadn’t even touched her, thanks to a ward of force magic she’d thrown up at the last moment.

“Next.”

“Whoa,” Mara breathed. “She’s good. Was she always that good? She didn’t seem like anything special back in Kozalin.”

“When did you see enough of her to know how she fights?” I asked.

“What, you think I didn’t scout out the competition? I spent way too much time on that mission trying to figure you all the crazy stuff you were doing.”

“Oh. Well, Alanna doesn’t usually show off without a good reason,” I explained. “No matter how skilled she is she’s just a dryad, and she doesn’t have a lot of raw power to throw around when she’s on her own. But give her a good wizard to bond with, and that’s another story.”

“Raw power is pretty much your specialty,” Mara agreed. “Was she using your force magic there?”

I nodded, but Aphrodite’s laughter drew my attention back to the stage.

“Silly Grunt, don’t you know dryads get stronger with age? This one could wrestle a frost giant, at least for a minute or two. You’ll have to make her use up her magic before you can beat her that way.”

“Brute force is for humans,” scoffed an elegantly dressed Vanir man as he took the stage. “Let’s see how you fare against one who can match your speed, and turn your own nature against you.”

“I already have a wizard,” Alanna declared. “And his… power… is much larger than yours.”

The elf scowled, and drew a pair of short swords. “Then we can do this the hard way.”

I wasn’t sure what this guy’s trick would be, but he didn’t keep me in suspense for long. As he closed in his blades suddenly burst into flames, and started leaving burning trails in the air behind them as they moved. He fought with sweeping, flamboyant movements that filled the space around him with fire as his blades clashing with Alanna’s spear.

When he couldn’t break through her guard, he took a deep breath and exhaled a gout of flame that completely enveloped her. That proved to be a mistake, though, because a moment later the point of her spear emerged from the conflagration to punch through his fancy shirt. The flames died away to reveal Alanna mostly unharmed, with just a bit of her hair burned away.

The elf retreated, dropping a sword to fumble at his belt pouch while his blood fountained from the wound. Alanna didn’t give him any respite, though, and when his hand came out with a potion in it she darted through his guard and deftly severed his arm at the elbow. With a second mortal wound gushing blood it wasn’t long before he collapsed.

“Oh ho, what’s this? A magic edge on your blades? That’s a new trick for you, Alanna,” Aphrodite observed. “Who is this wizard of yours?”

“Are your eyes failing you already? You saw us together but a few days ago. Next.”

Aphrodite’s eyes went wide, and then she turned her head to look over the crowd as best she could. After a moment she found me.

I smiled, and waved. Mara put her arm around me, and rested her chin on my shoulder.

Aphrodite’s delighted look almost made me reconsider this whole ploy.

Alanna’s next couple of opponents were nothing special for this crowd. Just big, tough guys who knew how to fight, and had enchanted weapons and armor to back up their skills and natural power. But they’d seen enough of her moves now that they took her seriously as an opponent, and didn’t make any dumb mistakes. Instead each fight dragged on for long minutes, filled with furious exchanges of blows and brief flashes of magic.

My dryad was burning power at an amazing rate to match their enhanced physical abilities, but it didn’t matter. Unlike my puny mortal self she could channel immense amounts of power without straining herself, and as long as she had mana little things like fatigue or injuries were no problem. The minor cuts and bruises her opponents managed to inflict faded away in moments, and she wasn’t even breathing hard.

Either of those guys would have wrecked me if I’d tried to fight them fair, though. Was Brand just overestimating me, or had he sent me here expecting that I’d lose?

Great. Now I had to worry what he was playing at, on top of everything else.

Opponent number five was another elf, but this one was a lot trickier than the first. The moment the announcer started the match he spread a handful of tiny stones onto the stage, which sprouted into a multitude of caltrops. Then he started casting a spell.

In the blink of an eye Alanna’s spear became a bow, and she loosed an arrow that gleamed with force magic at him. He broke off his casting to swat it away with his staff, but she was already loosing another. For a few moments he was pinned down by a furious barrage of arrows, forced to parry or block every shot because his own caltrop field kept him from dodging.

Then one of the arrows stopped in midair behind him, spun around, and came zooming back in to impale him from behind. The fight didn’t last long after that.

“See that, boys?” Aphrodite crowed. “Better watch yourselves around Alanna. She’s a back door kind of girl, but it’s not her who gets it from behind.”

“When in Athens, do as the Athenians do,” Alanna said. “Besides, shouldn’t you be over that by now? You can’t tell me you didn’t enjoy it.”

“Oh, I thought it was hilarious. But then I had to listen to Athena bitch about all her ruined plans for two hundred years. Her boy hero was supposed to sail off to despoil some Asian princess and kill a bunch of monsters, not lose his confidence and retire early.”

“It’s hardly my fault that he couldn’t handle what he dished out,” Alanna objected. “But perhaps that sort of battle would amuse you more? I believe I still have Big Don packed away somewhere.”

Another burly, bearded man stepped up onto the stage, and spat. “Woman, you’re going to regret that. I usually leave these battles to the young champions, so they can prove themselves. But it will be a cold day in Muspelheim before I let you get away with mocking our brave warriors and their sacred customs.”

Alanna blinked at him uncertainly. “You have sacred customs that involve buggery? Well, that changes my impression of Valhalla. Do the hall wenches grow penises after midnight, or is it the new recruits bending over for the veterans?”

The man’s face went red, and his hand went to his sword. “Insolent wench. I was talking about the Battle for Beauty’s Leash.”

“Since when is murdering each other for the right to be some woman’s next rapist a sacred rite? Ah, but I can hardly complain when I’m participating, can I? Tell me your name, so I know where to send the wergild.”

“I am General Boril, commander of the Gray Raven Army, and I’d be back tomorrow even if you could best me. But no slip of a girl is going to defeat a thousand year veteran. I’ll teach you that your place isn’t on the battle field, wench.”

“Do you think that I have lived for twenty thousand summers without learning my own nature, young man? Dryads are a dream of nature bound to man’s will by lust, and I welcome every night of service to my master. But no warrior’s mighty thews can bend my heart, for wit and wisdom are my weaknesses. So come try your sword against a wizard’s pet, and we’ll see if cold steel can defeat sorcery today.”

“Bold words, but if your wizard is so great why isn’t he up here?”

“For the same reason that your gods don’t let their sons do battle here,” Alanna replied. “He specializes in blowing things up, and the stage would never survive. Besides, I’m the one who wants to claim the bitch.”

“That’s magnificent bitch to you, mana slut,” Aphrodite put in.

Alanna’s lips twitched. “Do I need to muzzle you, bitch? That wood is warded against you, not me.”

“Ooh, that’s a great idea! Gag me with a big wooden dick,” Aphrodite suggested eagerly. “Shut me up good until you’re ready to tame me.”

Alanna rolled her eyes. “As if you were sane enough to tame. If you keep annoying me I may just order you to stand completely still and silent, and then put you in a closet and ignore you all week.”

Aphrodite pouted like a little girl. “Meanie. Alright, go on and kick everyone’s butts for me. I’ll be a good girl.”

“Those two have a lot of history, don’t they?” Mara murmured in my ear.

“Apparently. I’ll have to ask her about it when I get a chance.”

“Good idea. It’s kind of fun to watch them go at it, but the more they ignore Boril the more pissed off he gets. I wonder if they’re doing it on purpose?”

“I’m more interested by the fact that the announcer hasn’t interrupted them to get the fight started. The way he keeps looking at Aphrodite, I’m starting to think she’s the one who’s really running this show.”

“What? Don’t be stupid, Daniel. No woman would ever help arrange her own rape.”

My reply was interrupted by the announcer finally stepping in to call for the start of the match. I dropped the conversation, expecting things to get loud and violent very quickly. But Boril was too cagey for that, and instead he merely settled into a stance and met Alanna’s gaze for several long seconds.

A hush fell over the crowd. There was a heavy pressure in the air, an oppressive sense of menace that grew more overpowering with each passing second. But instead of being intimidated, Alanna’s face lit up with a delighted smile.

“Shao Lin aura technique, White Tiger style!” She exclaimed. “Congratulations, Boril. Few warriors would make the long journey to the East in search of martial enlightenment, and fewer still would be accepted as a student.”

Boril frowned at her. “You know kung fu?”

In answer Alanna slipped into a strange stance, feet wide and body held low to the ground. Her spear lost a foot of length as she held it high in one hand, while a second spear formed in her other hand held low.

“Serpent’s fangs pierce the tiger’s belly,” she proclaimed.

Boril scowled, and shifted into a completely different stance. “Ox tramples the serpent,” he growled.

Alana flowed into an improbable stance that looked like a bird perching on a wire, standing on the toes of one foot with the other one drawn up and both spears held high above her head. “Vermilion crane pierces the ox’s eyes.”

“You’re good,” Boril said reluctantly.

“The Monkey King found me amusing,” Alanna replied.

I wasn’t sure what that meant, but Boril was impressed. He made an odd shrugging motion, and the shield he wore on his back shifted down to rest on his arm. He set himself again, and this time his stance seemed more solid. Less whimsical. More flexible, solidly centered and ready to move in any direction.

“Then I’ll take you seriously,” he said.

Alanna came down from her exotic stance, and settled into a more normal-looking position as the second spear faded back to wherever it had come from. “Likewise.”

They both stood still for several long moments, watching one another carefully.

Aphrodite groaned. “Not this spirit duel bullshit. Come on, I want to see some blood on the stage! Fuck each other up al-”

Both opponents blurred into motion, and for an instant they were moving so fast I could barely tell what was happening. They met in the middle of the stage, weapons flashing in a flurry of elaborate moves.

Boril bellowed out a sharp war cry that struck Alanna like a freight train, blowing her back across the stage. But she caught herself with force magic, landing lightly at the edge of the stage and reversing course in a heartbeat to meet his eager charge head on. Her spear flashed out, and he deflected it with his shield while using his incredible reach to thrust his sword at her belly. But Alanna leaped over his blow, her feet landing on his shield for an instant while she stabbed again, and then she was flipping over him while his sword flashed through the air.

They were both bleeding when they separated, Alanna from an injured leg and Boril from a deep cut on his cheek. But both wounds were already starting to heal.

“Now I’ve got you,” Boril growled, and rushed her.

I suppose he thought the leg wound would slow her down, but it didn’t stop her from leaping twenty feet into the air to avoid his charge. In midair her spear became a bow again, and she launched a flurry of arrows down at him.

Boril raised his shield to intercept the arrows, and one by one they sunk into the wooden barrier and stuck. Their piercing enchantments weren’t quite enough to overcome its protective wards, but it turned out that they were only a distraction. The raised shield blocked his view of Alanna for a few critical seconds, and he had no idea that she could fly. He confidently predicted where she’d come down from that leap, and positioned himself to strike her as she landed. But as she fell back to the stage she changed her course, and touched down right behind him.

Some mystic sense must have warned him at the last instant, because Boril abruptly crouched and spun. Then both combatants were locked in a close-range melee, and moving too fast for me to track. There was a flurry of blows and dodges, a spray of blood, and a shrieking howl of noise that sounded like Grinder chewing through mail. A blast of ice shards momentarily hid them both, and a cold mist covered half the stage.

Then a sudden wind blew it away, revealing the two fighters facing each other warily from several paces apart. Boril’s side was a mangled mess of broken mail and charred flesh, which bled heavily. Alanna was projecting great claws of fire and whirling force blades from the fingers of her left hand, in imitation of Grinder’s blade, and Boril clearly wasn’t eager to get close to that again. But her right arm was gone from the elbow down.

“That will be that,” Boril said, his voice tight with pain. “I’ll heal in a few minutes, but there’s no restoring a limb that Cleaver has taken.”

“So much for defeating me with your great skill,” Alanna said tartly.

“Were you expecting some foolish chivalry? In the end what matters is victory.”

“Your sort always says that. I would rather have sparred with you for a bit longer, but if you’re going to insist on it I shall take my victory now.”

Alanna’s lithe form abruptly contracted, transforming into a dense mass of dark wood. Boril cursed, and started forward. But before he’d taken two steps Alanna was stepping back out of the log, which melted away as she left it. Her reformed body was completely healed, and by the time Boril came within reach she had a fresh spear in her hands.

He barely managed to parry her first attack, and she gave him no chance to retreat and heal. The gleaming point of her spear flashed and spun, each attack blending seamlessly into the next in an incredible display of martial skill, forcing Boril to parry and dodge frantically while his wound continued to bleed. Alanna wove blasts of force magic and bursts of impossible strength into her offensive, battering her opponent and knocking him off balance. Then she managed to grab the edge of his shield in her off hand, and muscle it out of the way long enough to land a kick on his wound.

Boril howled in agony. Even in that moment of distraction he kept his blade locked with her spear, but Alanna was happy enough to close to grappling distance instead. A horn of wood sprouted from her forehead, and she drove it up into the soft underside of his jaw. It punched up through the top of his helmet a moment later, and that grinding howl rose up again.

Boril’s head exploded.

A hush fell over the crowd. Boril’s headless body slumped to the ground, spraying a fountain of blood from the mangled horror that was left of his neck and head. Alanna stepped back, and for a moment the whole audience could see the foot-long lance of wood wreathed in violet fire that sprouted from her forehead. Then she banished the plasma, and re-absorbed the horn.

“Next.”

No one stepped onto the stage.

“Since when can you work fire?” Aphrodite asked, sounding more than a little shocked.

“Since I offered myself in partnership to the greatest wizard of this age,” Alanna said serenely. “I have all sorts of new tricks to show off.”

The armored dwarves appeared to drag off the body, and the announcer returned to the stage. Although he seemed a bit pale, and I noticed he kept well away from Alanna.

“That’s another victory for our challenger, folks! How many does that make now, Alanna?”

“Six,” Alanna said firmly. “Don’t mistake me for my little cousins, who find simple counting an impenetrable mystery. My wizard is so strong he can share the gift of Prometheus with me. I have a great many fascinating inventions to share.”

“Like the exploding fire horn?” The announcer asked nervously.

“Fire is the natural enemy of dryads, and my hold on it is the weakest of all my magics. But look, we do battle upon a wooden stage here. Perhaps I should play to my strengths from now on?”

Several men backed away from the waiting group of challengers, and for a moment I thought she might actually intimidate them into giving up. But there’s always an idiot. One of the younger men bounded up onto the stage, and brandished his halberd.

“You don’t scare me, wench! I’m Jack the Giant Slayer, and I’ll cut you down to size.”

Chapter 20

I hadn’t realized Alanna could animate any wood in her vicinity, whether she’d made it or not. Jack found out about that the hard way, when she got bored with his boasting and made the stage sprout a spike of wood right between his legs. His startled scream only lasted for a moment, before the spike reached his throat and cut off his air supply.

After watching him die no one with any sense wanted to step onto the stage, and the young hotheads weren’t much of a challenge. It wasn’t long before Alanna was collecting her prize, although it was obvious the crowd wasn’t very happy about it. She came swaggering back across the plaza with a smug grin on her face, leading Aphrodite on a leash. A group of massive, heavily armed and armored men trailed along behind her with ugly scowls on their faces.

“So you’re the wizard,” one of them said when the group reached me.

“You’ve got a lot of nerve, sending your pet monster girl to mess with our tournament,” another put in.

“What’s a living wizard doing in Asgard?” Another demanded.

“The Allfather brought me here to do a job for him,” I said. “The details are supposed to be secret.”

“Well, you’d better watch your step,” he growled. “Job or no job, Asgard is no place for scheming weaklings.”

“Yeah, you’d best finish up and get out quick,” another one said. “A lot of things can happen in a city under siege.”

“I bet them faeries will try to do raids to take out any wizards they hear about,” another one suggested.

“If the assassins don’t get him first. I hear the Lightbringers are after this joker,” the first one said.

They all laughed at that. “Yeah, he ain’t long for this world. Enjoy the bitch while you can, little man. It won’t last long.”

Mara clenched her fists, and took a step after them when they turned to go. I put a hand on her shoulder to hold her back.

“Keep it cool,” I said to her.

“You shouldn’t let those assholes talk to you like that,” she fumed. “You could take out all of them at once, no problem.”

“Sure, and then what? If I start a lethal fight in public all their buddies will join in, and if they start losing they’ll call for help. When the dust settles I‘ll end up in front of Odin, explaining why I thought it was a good idea to blow up half his city because some sore losers were talking trash to me.”

“There has to be something we can do,” she insisted.

I felt like there was a noose around my neck, and it was slowly tightening. This city was full of enemies, and it was only a matter of time before things went bad. Half of these guys would take a shot at me if they thought they could get away with it, and the other half would just step back and let the Lightbringers do their dirty work. And that was without any of my darker secrets coming to light. What would happen if Prince Caspar’s quest for blackmail material led him to one of the priests I’d killed in Lanrest?

“What we can do is finish our work here, and get the hell out of this city as soon as possible,” I said firmly. “How are you doing, Alanna?”

My familiar was still bouncing with excitement from her workout. “I’m quite well, Daniel. Thank you for the chance to do a little sparring. I’ve not had such entertainment in years.

Alanna offered me the control ring, but I closed her hand around it.

“You’re welcome. I think you should be the one to wear that, though. You won it fair and square.”

“Truly? How marvelous! I knew you’d be a kind and indulgent wizard.” She slipped the ring on, and held it up to the sunlight to admire it. “It is a pretty bauble, isn’t it? Aphrodite, tell me that you’d love to be my adoring pet for a week.”

“Fuck. I’d love to be your adoring pet for a week, mistress. You aren’t really still holding a grudge, are you?”

“A grudge? Now, why would I hold a grudge against you?” Alanna put a finger to her chin, and pretended to consider. “Could it be the time you charmed my wizard into seducing his king’s wife, and getting executed for the crime? Or perhaps that time you caught me alone, and thought it would be amusing to make me follow you around begging for your touch only to be denied every time? Oh, I know! Perhaps you feel guilty about calling me a dried-up old hag?”

“I never said that!” Aphrodite protested.

“Oh, you certainly did. You’ve simply forgotten about it, as you do every inconvenient truth. But come, we are both immortals. Why should I dwell on old slights, when the future stretches out so far before us. One never knows when the worm might turn again, right?”

“Right! Exactly! You can’t go too far, or you never know what might come of it.”

“Yes, that is the rule of the ancients. Of course, the other side of that rule is that one mustn’t be a pushover. After all, if there are no consequences to finding yourself in my power, why should you ever refrain from abusing me in the future? Kneel before me, Aphrodite.”

The bound goddess gulped, and obeyed.

“Love me,” Alanna commanded. “Yearn for me. Burn for my touch. Long for a kind word from me, or any sign of tenderness. I know you can do these things at my command, for even bound as you are your own soul is saturated with your divine power. But I know more than that. Part your veil of denial, and embrace these new feelings as truth. Now believe that I see through all your hidden plans for treachery, and feel yet more desire at being beaten so easily. Are we ready to realign your Thousand Perspective Mirror Maze in my favor?”

“H-how do you know about that?” Aphrodite protested.

“How do you think? I may not have the power that you gods are so proud of, but I have experience on my side. I’m sure your soul will have some inner defense that you’ve made yourself forget about, and you’ll eventually overcome any commands I might give you. But I wonder how long that will take, if I spend a week tying you in knots with your own power?”

“Please don’t,” Aphrodite asked meekly.

“No? Why shouldn’t I?” Alanna replied coldly.

Aphrodite bowed her head, and sighed.

“I did a lot of stupid things before the Fall,” she finally said. “Now I’m paying the price for it. I have no real allies, only enemies and pawns, and no one cares because I was always such a bitch to them before. I’m sorry, Alanna. I was cruel to you, more than once, and you did nothing to deserve it.”

“Tell me why,” Alanna demanded.

“Because it made me feel better about my own situation. Trapped in a pathetic sham of a marriage with that disgusting cripple Hephaestus, with half the gods on Olympus plotting ways to rape me while the goddesses wished me dead. Abusing the weak made me feel like I wasn’t completely powerless. It wasn’t until the Fall that I realized I’d been cutting my own throat the whole time. Do you have any idea how many gods and immortals have come here to laugh at my fate, and tell me how they could have rescued me if they cared to bother?”

“I could likely name them all,” Alanna said. “But I am not one of their number. I have never had the power to oppose a king of gods directly, nor the reckless bravado to make the attempt. I have always made it my policy to offer friendship to those powers who will accept it, and simply avoid those who will not. The world is vast, and those who live by the sword always die by it long before they could discover all of my anchors."

“I could really use a friend right now,” Aphrodite said.

“Perhaps. Or perhaps you think to use me for your own ends. The days of your captivity here are coming to an end, after all. What token of your sincerity can you offer?”

Aphrodite nervously licked her lips.

“Punish me,” she declared. “I know I’ve wronged you, but you have a reputation for fairness. So balance the scales between us, and let us start over. I won’t hold any grudges as long as whatever you do with me is just, and when you’re done I shall owe the first favor.”

Alanna snorted. “Silly slut. You just want me to spank you, don’t you?”

“Yes! You’re so hot when you do that all-knowing elder being thing. Make me be a good girl for you, mistress. I’ll remember you fondly when I’m free.”

“I’m sure you will,” Alanna said serenely. “Now stand up, and stop temping me so. Daniel, what do you intend to do with her?”

I cleared my throat, still trying to figure out what had just happened. Did they make up, or not, or was it all just some kind of game?

Maybe I should just trust Alanna to take care of things on that front. She seemed to know what she was doing, and I sure as hell wasn’t having any luck trying to figure Aphrodite out.

“First, we need to get her some clothes. Aphrodite, do you have someone waiting around ready to dress you?”

She turned those piercing blue eyes on me with an amused smile. “Of course, master of my mistress. Would you like me in chains, or leather, or perhaps one of those gauzy things the Vanir so love?”

“No, I mean actual clothes. Something practical, because it’s going to be dirty and dangerous where we’re going.”

Yeah, astonished was a good look on Aphrodite.

“Why would you want to take me somewhere like that? Daniel, I could get hurt, and I might not be able to heal myself. If I die my soul will be pulled back to the trap that holds my divinity, and your week will be cut short.”

“Alanna’s week,” I corrected. “I’m not going to be doing anything with you. But I’ll make sure you don’t die, as long as you listen to me. Now, can you arrange something or do we need to stop by  a tailor shop first?”

As it turned out she had a whole coterie of scantily clad elf girls following her around, ready to supply her every need. They commandeered the back room of a nearby shop for Aphrodite to dress in, and she emerged in an outfit that made her look like some fairy tale princess going out for a ride. Tight pants of something that looked like leather, but clung to her every curve. A silk blouse cut to emphasize her tiny waist and generous bust, with a low neckline to expose plenty of cleavage. High-heeled boots, elbow-length gloves and a jaunty little hat rounded out the ensemble, all in a combination of green and white.

I realized I was staring, and looked away. But not before I caught her smug little smile.

“I suppose that’s the closest thing to practical we’re going to see you in,” I said.

“It will hold up better than you might expect, Daniel. It’s all the finest of Vanir craftsmanship, and heavily enchanted. So, what is this mysterious errand of ours?”

“You’ll see. Alanna, see if you can use this.”

I gave her the giant ruby that I’d gotten from Brand. Aphrodite gasped in shock when she saw it.

Alanna shot her a smug look of her own, and pressed the gem to the empty socket in the ring. It sank into place, and Alanna gazed at it thoughtfully.

“Hmm. Yes, I see. Are you entrusting me with the decision of which locks to open, Daniel?”

“Yes.”

She smiled, and moved to lean into my side. “You see, girl? A few short weeks as his familiar, and already my wizard will place the power of a goddess in my hands. This is the benefit of being trustworthy.”

“Yes, yes, I’ve heard this all before,” Aphrodite said sourly. “But it’s far too late to change now, so why taunt me with my mistakes? What do you plan to do with that?”

“Daughter of the sea, be free to call the waves once more,” Alanna said.

Aphrodite gasped, and swayed unsteadily. But Alanna wasn’t done yet.

“Devotion, submission, rapture, abandon and satisfaction, these aspects I unlock to the fullness of their potential. Allure, delight, misdirection and persuasion, these aspects I let loose under the leash of my intention. Health and vitality, strength and agility, wash away the mortality of this fragile shell, and unleash the divinity within.”

Aphrodite collapsed into Alanna’s arms. The elder dryad held the goddess’s trembling form while a tidal wave of divine magic flooded through her, transforming flesh and blood into something entirely different. When it was done Aphrodite stood several inches shorter than she had before, although somehow her clothes still fit. She snuggled into Alanna’s embrace with a sigh.

“It’s been a long time since I could stretch even this much,” she said. “But why those aspects, linked like that? Am I to be your little servant slut, bending men to your will? Others have tried to make me their tool before, you know.”

“We both know you enjoy playing at submission,” Alanna said. “You would never have survived this ordeal otherwise. But I ask you, am I trustworthy?”

Aphrodite looked up at her, and pouted. “You’re really going to play that card? After everything I’ve been through? We can’t at least deal as equals?”

“You are the laughing mirror of a thousand faces, every one of them a lie,” Alanna said. “If I trust you even a little you will betray me, as surely as the scorpion stings the toad. But I say to you, aid me honestly for but a week, and you will be quite pleased by the results.”

“Just a week? You could keep winning the tournament,” Aphrodite said suspiciously.

“In all the days since the Titans drove back the long winter, have I ever betrayed anyone?” Alanna said.

“No, but you’re just a finger puppet for your wizard’s magic if that’s what he wants,” Aphrodite replied.

“Have I ever been forced to betray anyone by my wizard?” Alanna said. “Besides, as you just pointed out, I’m only a dryad in the end. How long will it take you to seduce my heart into thinking you a grove sister, to be loved and protected above all else? A week? Two? I don’t dare hold your leash for long, or I shall find myself on the other end of it.”

Aphrodite huffed. “Fine. You’re right, you’re the straightest of the straight arrows. Even if that’s all a con, you’re not going to blow ten thousand years of setup on something this trivial. But what are you two planning here?”

“Us three, actually,” Mara said.

For the first time, Aphrodite really looked at Mara. For a moment she seemed confused, but then her eyes went wide.

“You!”

“Yep, me.”

“What are you doing here?”

Mara grinned. “What do you think? We’ve got some fun times on the way. Now aren’t you glad you decided to play along?”

Aphrodite glanced around and bit her lip, obviously concerned that anything incriminating she said might be overheard.

“And on that note, it’s time to get moving,” I interrupted. “Alanna, we need to head out to the Spire again. Aphrodite, do you have a convenient way to fly? If not I can carry you. Just don’t take that as an invitation to try charming me.”

“In that case, I’m heading out,” Mara said. “I’ve got some errands to run. See you tonight, Daniel?”

“Sure.”

Mara sauntered off. Aphrodite turned to watch her go, still looking a bit shell-shocked. “Is she really…?”

“Not here,” I said. “Alanna?”

My dryad took Aphrodite’s chin in her hand, and turned the goddess’s head back to look at her. “You are not to turn your charms against my wizard,” she said sternly. “I shall take that as a betrayal of our accord, and respond most severely. Are we clear upon this point?”

“Alright, Alanna. I can’t help flirting, but I won’t use any magic on your boytoy.”

Alanna seemed satisfied by that, so I decided not to worry about the potential loopholes in the wording. She returned to her armor form, wrapping me in a full-body embrace as she grew her usual shell of enchanted steel.

I sighed in relief. Even in my new cloak and tabard I’d been feeling pretty exposed without her, especially considering how long we’d been standing around here. I scooped Aphrodite up in a bridal carry, and took flight before the Lightbringers managed to organize another assassination attempt.

Aphrodite gave a surprised squeak when we took off, and threw her arms around me. But as we rose smoothly into the air she relaxed, and looked around.

“Well now, this is something you don’t see every day,” she purred. “Wizards who try to fly usually make a mess of it. Have you joined the mile high club yet, Daniel?”

I chuckled. “What is it about flying and bad girls? I bet you’d love Cerise’s hovercycle.”

“What’s that?”

“A personal flying golem, basically. You ride it like a horse, and it can only go up a few feet off the ground, but it moves faster than a diving falcon.”

“Oh, my. That sounds positively delightful. Is that the Spire?”

The dead barrens were coming into view now, and I nodded. “Yeah. The whole thing is saturated in invisible energies that will kill anything alive, so pay close attention to your health. I’m not sure if it will do anything to you the way you are now, but if it does I can put a protective spell on you and heal the damage.”

“Perhaps you should do that now, as a precaution?” She suggested. “I would really prefer not to risk being forced back to my prison. It’s an unpleasant experience.”

I shrugged. “Fair enough. Stick close to me while we’re moving around, though. There are a lot of exotic hazards in there, and it wouldn’t be practical to duplicate all my wards.”

“I’m quite content where I am,” Aphrodite said, with a touch of mischief in her eyes.

She studied me intently as I wrapped her in a healing aura, and linked it to my amulet. If she got more than a few dozen feet away from me the link would break and the whole thing would fall apart, but that was good enough for this trip.

“You really don’t intend to ravish me, do you?” She said.

“No, I really don’t.”

“Why not? You can’t expect me to believe that you truly don’t desire me?”

I shrugged. “I’m not big on rape. Especially not this eternal captivity thing the Aesir have going on.”

She sniffed. “You probably couldn’t handle me anyway.”

I should have known better than to try to be serious with her. I finished setting the enchantment, and resumed my descent towards the Spire.

“Yeah, I’d probably have to build some demented sex golem to keep you busy when I need to recover,” I joked. “You seem to be pretty into bondage, so maybe a steel framework to chain you to and a couple of big dildos that just keep working away on you forever. Or I could break out the flesh magic, and make some kind of tentacle pod thing.”

“Tentacle pod? I’m not quite sure what you’re getting at there, but it sounds intriguing. Careful, or you might convince me to come investigate once I’m free.”

“Just wait until after Ragnarok,” I told her. “It would take weeks to make something that complicated, and if I get that distracted right now I’ll get killed one way or another. By the way, we can talk here. We’re inside the Spire’s wards, and I’m pretty sure no one else has been here in a long time.”

“I think you’re right. Few would dare to come here, considering the kind of traps the Atlanteans could have left. Are you an Atlantean, Daniel Black?”

“No. I’m Hecate’s Champion.”

“Hah! I knew they were lying when they said they’d caught her. Did she send you for me? We’ve never been allies, exactly, but we weren’t enemies either.”

“No, I haven’t had a chance to speak with her since I got stuck here. Trying to contact her from Asgard sounds like a really stupid idea, so I’m not planning on trying it. But I know she’s taking advantage of Odin’s distraction to gather allies, and I’m sure she’d be willing to talk to you if we can figure out a way to get you out of here.”

“The Unraveler seems very talented at breaking bonds,” Aphrodite said. “That was really her, wasn’t it? She has her father’s eyes.”

“Yes, that was Mara. But she’s my friend and ally, not my servant, and she’s here on her own mission. I don’t think she’s strong enough to free you and her brother without a good rest in between, and obviously the Aesir aren’t going to make it that easy.”

She studied me intently. “I can’t believe Hecate has thrown in with Loki. No, this is a personal relationship.”

I shrugged. “Yeah, we kind of went from lying and manipulating to trying to kill each other to being lovers.”

She giggled. “Sounds like my kind of relationship. So what is it you want me to do for you here? I’ll warn you, wizardry has never been my forte. The living magic of sorcery and faith is my art, not this rigid sculpting of dead stone and metal.”

“The rod I showed you is broken,” I told her. “Odin wants me to fix it, so he can use it on his enemies. I can do that, but obviously I’m not too keen on handing him that kind of weapon, so I’ve been dragging my feet while I try to come up with a way out of this mess.”

“Ah. Perhaps the horse will learn to sing?”

Funny, how many stories this world shares with my own. “Exactly. But they’re getting impatient, and if I don’t give them some visible progress soon they’re going to start kidnapping my coven mates and… well, I’m sure you can imagine.”

Her expression turned serious. “Yes, I can well imagine what they would do with a murder witch. Who else is in your coven? At least one hearth witch, I would imagine.”

“Yeah, Avilla’s a pretty amazing witch. She’s technically a golem, but she has a soul, so that just means she’s immortal and has the mana capacity of a demigoddess. The other two are a faerie lady and Bast’s new high priestess.”

“Bast? But she’s dead!”

“I helped her arrange to be reborn,” I said. “Anyway, just bringing you here will buy me a few days. I told Brand there’s a big leak of solar fire that’s stopping me from finishing the job, and he suggested using your water aspect to put it out.”

“I see. Does this fiery obstacle actually exist?”

“Yes. I’ve been trying to avoid telling outright lies, in case I run into someone who can detect them. There are other ways I could have dealt with it if I really wanted to, but this is certainly the easiest.”

“Perhaps. But you clearly have more in mind than playing for time.”

“I have a lot of pieces that I’m trying to fit together into a workable plan. So, how does this imprisonment setup the Aesir have you in work? Is this body like a puppet, that you’re controlling remotely while your real self is locked in a cell someplace?”

“No, Daniel. This is the real goddess of beauty you’re holding in your arms, not some doppelganger. But they have me tied to a soul trap that catches my essence if my body dies, and drags me back to my soul gem so I can’t reform properly. That way they can be sure to retrieve the collar, and put it back on me as soon as I reform.”

“Interesting. Can you explain how that works?”

Her brow furrowed. “I suppose I could try. Mortals rarely manage any comprehension of such arts, but you aren’t exactly a normal wizard.”

“I have mana sorcery,” I told her. “If it involves magic, I can figure it out.”

“Sorcery over magic itself? No wonder you have such a habit of doing the impossible. Where did Hecate find a man with such an unheard of power?”

“You’ll have to ask her that.”

“Ah, she’s been fishing in the sea of worlds, hasn’t she? It’s the only thing that fits. What did she do, drag you through primal chaos and let you absorb its power?”

The look on my face must have been answer enough. She giggled, and kissed my cheek. “Silly man, did you think to hide such an obvious secret from me while holding me so close? I have but to lay my cheek against yours, and feel the song of your sorceries. But perhaps Hecate didn’t tell you that we gods arose from the void?”

I shrugged. “I haven’t had a lot of time to get up to speed on things like that since I got here. Too busy just trying to survive. Divine aspects are like a greater version of sorceries, aren’t they?”

“Now I’m sure you haven’t been in this world for long,” Aphrodite said. “But you’ve got the right general idea. A sorcery is what happens when a living soul touches the primal chaos that lies between worlds, and asks it for understanding. An aspect is what happens when an idea bubbling up from the chaos brushes against the dreams of the living, and gains an awareness of its own.”

I’m surprised to hear you break Zeus’ bans so casually, Alanna said to us both. Do not the gods hold these matters secret from mortals?

“What do I care for preserving the rule of the gods? They can all die on the blades of outraged mortals for all I care. But if I share my secrets freely, perhaps you’ll part with a few of yours. Alanna, is it true that the Great Beasts are just divine spirits who clawed their way into the waking world before men invented language?”

Even I am not old enough to answer that from firsthand knowledge. As best I can tell, I was born in the days when words first began to shape the dreams of men. But I think there are three kinds of being that we lump together as Great Beasts. There are what the Titans called the Ancient Beasts, gods who were born into the world in the ages before man and thus have the minds of beasts instead of men. There are the great nightmares that have emerged since the dreamlands took firm shape, ascending to a semblance of godhood by devouring their lesser kin. And then there are the interlopers from distant worlds. Beings of savage cruelty and endless destruction who were driven out of their homes, or else devoured them and went looking for fresh prey.

“Lovely,” I said. Then I noticed the shocked look on Aphrodite’s face.

“You gave me a serious answer,” she said.

There are many benefits to honoring an alliance with me, Alanna replied. I, too, have no great love of the tradition of keeping secrets, and in the present chaos I dare to speak more freely than usual. But perhaps we should set aside this distraction, and return to my wizard’s question?

“Oh. Right. Alright, I suppose we can give this a try. First you need to understand how a sealed soul trap works. Have you ever constructed such a thing, Daniel?”

“No, but I’ve pretty much finished reverse-engineering the ones here in the Spire. I could build something like that if I wanted to.”

“This place would be full of such things, wouldn’t it? Can we go to the chamber that holds them? If you show me how they work, I can point out where my own prison is different.”

“Sounds like a plan.”

It wasn’t a complete solution, but it was a start. Now if only I could be sure Aphrodite wouldn’t stab me in the back at the worst possible moment.

Chapter 21

Working with Aphrodite was a trying experience. It wasn’t that she was trying to cause trouble, exactly. It’s just that her flirty, mischievous, endlessly troublesome manner didn’t seem to have an off switch. Alanna was as frustrated as I’d ever seen her before the afternoon was half done, and I wasn’t much better off.

But she made the effort worthwhile. Together she and Alanna easily answered all of my theoretical questions about soul magic, and studying her bindings told me a lot about the practical issues. They were built in a very different style than the Atlantean enchantments I’d been looking at up until then, and comparing the two was a tremendous help. Not to mention Aphrodite’s personal advice on the issues involved in toying with mortal souls.

By sunset I’d confirmed that my ideas for getting the twins out of Valhalla would work, and I was sure I could give them living bodies when we got home. I’d need a blood sample from someone to serve as a starting point for their new bodies, and on a genetic level they’d end up being clones of the donor, but that wasn’t likely to be a problem. I could still use my flesh magic to make them look like whatever I wanted, it just wouldn’t necessarily be hereditary.

The other side of the project was a lot harder, and I wasn’t able to make things work as smoothly as I would have liked. I’d started out with hopes of making a soul jar that could catch my soul if I died, and just conjure a new body for me using flesh magic. That would have been an ideal backup plan, not just now but for the future, and seeing the looks on people’s faces when I returned from the dead would have been hilarious.

Alas, it wasn’t really practical. Growing a whole body from a tissue sample was a phenomenally complex application of flesh magic, much harder than just healing typical injuries. Different parts of the body always ended up growing at different rates, depending on all sorts of subtle factors, and even when that wasn’t fatal it caused a lot of strange defects. Waking up with my head on backwards and one arm twice as big as the other might be better than dying, but it wasn’t a ‘solution’ I was prepared to implement.

Even if I solved that problem, the soul manipulation would have been an even bigger challenge. Disembodied souls normally aren’t aware enough to do anything, and trying to modify yourself to fix that problem is a short road to insanity. Binding a soul to a device that can reel it in after you die would have similar problems, and then there was the issue of putting it into a fresh body safely. That was easily as complex as growing a body, and if I was dead I wasn’t going to be awake to direct the process.

Besides, mortals who die in Asgard get their souls caught up in Odin’s resurrection system. Especially if they die in battle. I still didn’t have a clear idea of how that worked, so betting that I could avoid it somehow didn’t seem like a smart idea. It would be all too easy to get myself trapped here as some kind of wizard einherjar.

“Alanna, can you access your bower from here?” I asked as I was mulling over my options.

“Of course. Where do you think I kept those spears?”

“You weren’t just making them as you needed them?” Aphrodite asked.

“Ah, if only I were so adept. I could do that with wood, of course, but enchanted steel is another matter. Even with Daniel’s sorcery it takes too long to make such things properly, so I’ve been building up a collection. I simply keep them in my armory, and call them out when I have a use for them. Is there something you wish me to keep for you, Daniel?”

“Several things,” I replied. “Can you still do that in armor form? Like, if I pick something up could you pull it into your bower?”

“Certainly. Shall I help you pretend to have mastery of a personal space, Daniel? It might give your enemies pause, to see you drawing new weapons from nowhere as the need arises.”

“That does sound like fun,” I agreed. “But I was considering something more elaborate. You don’t have a significant weight limit, do you? I remember your bower was pretty big.”

“You could say that,” she said, sounding amused. “Where is this trail leading us?”

“Oh, I was just thinking that if I’m going to fake my own death I’ll need to leave a body somewhere, and it takes a few hours to make one. So I’ll need someplace to stash it until I need it.”

“A hollow shell won’t fool a god,” Aphrodite told me. “A body that has never had a soul feels different than one that’s been used.”

“Yeah, I figured that part out. But what about a body that was used for many years, and then put in storage for a few days? Because I think I can see how to make a body swapping device.”

Their dumbfounded expressions told me I was on to something with that idea. A device that could move a living soul from one body to another was a good bit easier than a remote resurrection system, but it was still fiendishly complex. It turned out neither of them had ever heard of a mortal pulling off a feat like that before, so it wasn’t something Odin was likely to suspect either.

“Where do you get these crazy ideas?” Aphrodite grumbled.

I shrugged. “An old story, actually. But hey, is it really a crazy idea if it works?”

“Yes!” She insisted. “You do realize this isn’t going to be pleasant?”

“I’ll cope. Convincing Odin that I’m really dead is the key to this whole thing. If he even suspects I’ve escaped he’ll go after my girls as leverage, and I can’t let that happen.”

Aphrodite’s expression turned unusually serious at that. “You’re not going to be able to go home, are you?”

I sighed. “Probably not. At least, not until Asgard is under siege and the Aesir have their hands full fighting Loki’s army. I suppose I could change my face and try to sneak back before then, but it’s a big risk.”

“A single spy in the wrong place could ruin the whole deception,” Alanna agreed. “But we will have a journey ahead of us in any event. If I try to return us to my tree from here Asgard’s wards will see the effort, and they might well prevent it. At the very least we will need to travel far from the city before returning to Midgard.”

“Jump to a different tree,” Aphrodite advised. “One that isn’t in Europe.”

“A different tree? I have no idea what you’re referring to,” Alanna said in mock astonishment. “Surely you know that a dryad can have only one tree?”

“Like a hamadryad only has one forest?” The goddess replied. “Fine, play dumb if you like, but don’t take any chances. They have some really good trackers here. I’ve escaped four times, but they always find me and drag me back.”

“Not this time,” I said. “But let’s not get ahead of ourselves. I need to show some progress if I’m going to keep them off my back, so it’s about time we took a look at this broken control run.”

The fire I’d told Brand about emerged from a broken conduit, which was supposed to carry an uncomfortably large stream of compressed plasma away from the sun tap. I had no idea what it was for, but given the amount of energy involved I was cautious about touching it. There was no way I could dissipate that much heat with a spell, and engineering a magic item powerful enough to deal with it would probably have taken a couple of days. Fire wasn’t my best element, and I certainly didn’t want to throw a jet of water into it. I know just enough physics to realize that I’d get a huge steam explosion, but not nearly enough to calculate how bad it would be.

Aphrodite laughed when she saw it. “This is your troublesome obstacle? A flame that’s already half tamed?”

“I have no idea what you mean by that,” I said. “But it’s being drawn off of the main sun tap, and I don’t have a good way to measure the energy density. It would be really embarrassing to start putting it out, and then realize it’s ten times as dangerous as I thought and I just destabilized it.”

“Bah. Stand back, puny mortal, and let a goddess show you how it’s done.” She cracked her knuckles theatrically, and stepped up to the barrier. I cautiously backed up a few feet, watching the magic swirl around her. She made a sweeping gesture, and an invisible vortex of elemental power gathered around her. A torrent of water-aspected mana a thousand times stronger than anything I’d ever worked, intermingled with complex weaves of life, earth and ice.

She snapped her fingers. Just like that, the roaring flame was snuffed out. The crystalline walls of the passageway began to cool, and a sheet of intensely blue ice covered the gaping hole in the side of the plasma conduit.

“There you go. One raging inferno quenched.”

“Impressive. How long will that last?” I asked, eyeing the patch.

She sauntered back over to me, and put her hand on my chest. “Still worried about the scary fire? Don’t worry, I’ll protect you.”

“Wench.” I gave her a swat on the butt, and walked over to take a closer look at the patch. She giggled, and pressed herself against me as I walked by.

“That’s more like it,” she purred, pressing those magnificent breasts against my side. “But shouldn’t you carry me again? You wouldn’t want me to accidentally get too far away, and die from the tower’s curse.”

“I think you’re perfectly capable of staying inside my wards on your own,” I said.

The patch wasn’t normal ice, and it was being kept frozen by a monstrously powerful spell that was still drawing power from Aphrodite. It would last as long as she was nearby and supporting it, but after we left it would probably fail in a few hours. Good enough.

Aphrodite pouted at me. “So cold! Are we not allies, now? Think how tragic it would be, if my golden hair were to fall out.”

“You just don’t want to bother walking,” I pointed out.

“Why should I walk when there’s a man to carry me? Don’t try to tell me you didn’t enjoy it.”

“Yeah, but now I need to get some work done.”

Fear not, Daniel. I shall keep this troublesome wench distracted.

Aphrodite was already pressed against me, so she had no time to react when the steel surface of my armor suddenly vanished and the wood beneath started to grow. In the blink of an eye the sultry sex goddess was bound in wooden manacles, and a gag had plugged her mouth. Tentacles of dark wood flowed out to engulf her, moving like a mass of viscous fluid, and wrapped around her until she was completely hidden. Then the dark mass withdrew into my armor, leaving nothing behind.

“Did you just drag her into your bower?” I asked.

Yes. You were about to begin your work, were you not? Aphrodite would be bored in moments, and then she’d begin distracting you in search of entertainment. Allow me to keep her occupied while you work.

“What are you going to do, tie her up in your basement?”

For a start. She desperately needs a good spanking. These einherjar are far too soft, letting her bend their wills with her honeyed words. I know better than to let her speak.

“It’s a good thing I have you here to look after me,” I said. “Alright, you girls have fun. I’ll just be out here working.”

Poor, put-upon man. Would you rather I tie her up for you, so you can have your way with her?

“Don’t tempt me,” I said. “I swear, that woman gets more beautiful every time I look at her. If I spend too much time around her I’m going to do something I’ll regret.”

Not while I am here, Alanna replied, sounding short of breath. Ooh, I’d forgotten how delicious she looks in chains. I just want to pounce on her, and make her scream my name!

“Knock yourself out,” I told her. “Just try not to be too distracting.”

Of course. She pulled away, weakening our connection until all I felt was a vague impression of her. I sighed, feeling vaguely disgruntled, and shook my head. What did I expect? Like a dryad and a sex goddess were going to keep their minds on business for long.

It took a couple of hours to build a more permanent patch, but I did that first. Just in case Aphrodite got a little too distracted in there, and let her spell lapse. Once I was sure I wasn’t at risk of getting a surprise plasma enema I relaxed a little, and settled in to finish tracing the Spire’s soul trap enchantments.

Sure enough, there was a major junction right behind the area that the flames had blocked. A maze of control runs and astral corridors, sympathetic magic and ectoplasmic teleporters, all meant to transfer captured souls between the prison on the lower floors and the rods that every Atlantean wizard had once carried. Half the mechanism had been melted by long ages of exposure to that ruptured conduit, and almost all of the links were broken, so figuring out how any of it was supposed to work was a royal bitch.

If not for my mana sorcery it would have been a doomed effort. Even with it I might not have gotten anywhere if I’d been a native of this world. The Spire’s mechanisms were far more complex than anything I’d seen the Red Conclave use, and they were full of strange abstractions and remarkably obtuse design elements.

But I’d worked on software systems that had more complexity. If you want to do systems engineering you have to be good at wading into a tangled mess of poorly designed code and figuring out how it works, and this wasn’t that different. More like circuit design than traditional programming, maybe, but I knew a bit about that too. My mana sorcery was happy to translate between all those familiar abstractions and their magical equivalents, and it did a lot of the heavy lifting for me. At this point I could unravel enchantments even faster than I’d been able to read code in my old life.

It was a good thing, too, because this was a tough job. It took hours to work out how the rod connections were supposed to tie into the rest of the Spire’s enchantments, and find one that was still intact. That was critical, because it would take forever to re-create something like without a working example. Rebuilding the router that handled switching between the various channels would be hard enough.

Not that I actually wanted to do either of those things. But I was going to go back to Brand with a time estimate on this repair job, and the Aesir would be fools to just take me at my word. At the very least he’d have a lie detector, and there was no telling what else a god could come up with along those lines. So I’d better make sure anything I told them was as true and accurate as I could manage, and assume that if I actually promised to do something they’d know if I didn’t intend to deliver.

Was it just arrogance, that Odin hadn’t bothered to get a formal promise out of me before? Or was there something else going on there? I had no idea, and I wasn’t going to disturb Alanna with random questions right now. It felt like things were getting pretty intense for her at the moment, and I didn’t really want to get a full-force impression of exactly what she was feeling.

Back to the repairs. I roughed out an idea for fixing the router, and dug deeper into the piping to see what else might need work. There were barriers and wards, pumps and teleporters, all sorts of strange and complex enchantments. Most of the components made sense once I spent a few minutes studying them, even if the overall design was a horrible Rube Goldberg machine on a par with their matter-to-mana devices.

Then I stumbled on a piece that didn’t fit. Visually it looked like just another crystalline doodad in a twisted rat’s nest of similar parts, but what was it supposed to do? The magic it radiated was mostly just random squiggles that didn’t accomplish anything, and the parts that were functional just attached it to the main soul feed and…

I blinked, looking closer. That was a divination scrambler. I hadn’t seen anything like that in the Spire so far. My sorcery figured out the scrambling mechanism as easily as it had on the wards around Fenrir’s prison, and I adjusted my mage sight to see through it. But what I found beneath was even more confusing.

A completely different style of enchantment. An intricate mechanism made of gold hidden inside that crystalline shell, with each part covered in neat, orderly inscriptions. Not the Norse runes that so many wizards in Varmland favored for their enchantments, or the Latin that the Runesage had used. This writing was all pictograms.

Egyptian pictograms.

“Fuck!”

Alanna must have sensed my shock, because our connection suddenly strengthened again. Is something wrong, Daniel? She asked distractedly.

“The Lightbringers have been in here,” I said.

Suddenly I had her full attention. Have they? How?

“Hell if I know. But this thing definitely isn’t Atlantean magic, or Aesir. It’s… oh, shit. This thing is a bomb.”

Are we in danger?

I studied the device for another moment, carefully tracing the threads of magic that reached out into the devices around it.

“No, I don’t think so. This thing has been here for a long time, so they didn’t plant it just to deal with me. It looks like it’s designed to go off if someone tries to repair the soul router, and trigger an energy surge that would kill them and trap their souls in the prison. But as long as I don’t touch anything it won’t go off.”

Good. But that is a bit perplexing. If the Lightbringers have the means to defeat the Spire’s curse, why haven’t they entirely destroyed it by now?

“Interesting question. I can see reasons why they might be cautious about doing more damage, though, especially if they’re getting incomplete information from their divination spells. This thing is still connected to the sun, and breaking it the wrong way could cause all kinds of devastation. If it was still on Midgard there’s a small chance it could devastate the whole world.

They would be hesitant to take such a risk, Alanna said. So you suspect they have merely set traps for any wizard who seeks to repair the Spire?

“That’s what it looks like to me. It’s a little odd that I got this deep before running into one, though. There must be some serious issues involved in planting things here, or they’d have done more of it. Maybe their shielding just keeps agents from dying right away, but the radiation poisoning still gets them after a few hours. Or maybe it uses up something that they only have a limited supply of.”

High wizardry often has such limits. Does this change your plans?

“Maybe. If nothing else it means I have to worry about getting attacked here. I’d been hoping we could use the Spire as a safe refuge, but if they got an agent in here to plant bombs they can probably arrange to send in some assassins too.”

Perhaps we should retreat to our rooms?

"They’ve already tried us once there. It’s only a matter of time before they make another try. No, I think this is still one of the less likely places for them to hit us. I’m sure they’re preparing for it by now, just in case they have to bite the bullet. But they almost got me the first time, and they don’t know how fast I can improve my gear. Whatever it costs them to get in here, they aren’t going to pay the price except as a last resort. Not when there are so many easy options they haven’t tried yet.

You’re probably right, Alana agreed. Most likely they will obtain local assistance, and arrange for a whole hunter team to ambush us.

One of those guys was bad enough. Trying to fight three or four of them at once would be a nightmare. Throw in a dozen guys like the ones Alanna had fought today, and that would be game over for sure. One way or another I had to end this before they could arrange something like that. But how?

My gaze fell on the bomb again.

“Alanna,” I said slowly. “Ask Aphrodite if she knows who these assassins would be getting their information from.”

Of course. She claims to know all the dealers of gossip and secrets that infest the Golden City’s underbelly. Do you think to track them to their hidden lair, and prepare an ambush of our own?

“If we were just trying to survive that might be a good idea,” I said. “But given all our other complications, I’ve got a different idea in mind. Are they talking to Prince Caspar?”

Why would Caspar want to speak with… oh, that treacherous dog! Yes, she says he met one of them at the Slick Vixen just last night.

“Excellent. Then all we have to do is drop a few hints in the right ears.”

What reckless gamble are you planning this time, you maniac?

“Oh, it’s not that reckless. I just have to pull the wool over the eyes of the Aesir, manipulate the most experienced assassins in the world, and win an impossible battle or two. All in a day’s work for me, right? Bring Aphrodite back out so she can listen, and tell me what you think of this.”

Alanna was skeptical at first, but the sheer brazen effrontery of the plan won her over in the end. I wasn’t going to be sleeping much in the next couple of days, because I had a lot of work to do if I wanted to have any chance of pulling it off. But if it worked we’d be out of Asgard, and no one was going to be looking for us. Of course, if I came up short anywhere along the line I was screwed.

“I’m going to have to visit a confectioner, and lay in a supply of popcorn,” Aphrodite pronounced. “Win or lose, this is going to be marvelously entertaining.”

“I’m so glad my antics amuse you,” I told her. “You do realize that the first thing I need to do is defuse this bomb, right?”

Her smile didn’t waver. “If Alanna Firescorn believes that you can do this, then I will trust you as well. Besides, I’m pretty sure my bindings are stronger than this suction effect. So worst case it eats you guys, and then I end up back in my soul gem being interrogated by Odin.”

“What a lovely thought. Alanna, maybe you should go back to making sure she doesn’t distract me?”

Chapter 22

It was a couple of hours after dawn when I landed on the roof of the gatehouse, and told the guards there I needed to talk to Gustav. They were obviously expecting me, because the sergeant just nodded and detailed a man to show me the way.

He didn’t have an office, of course. You need cheap paper and widespread literacy to make modern bureaucracy possible, so in Asgard paperwork was still the province of a handful of scribes. But apparently meetings are universal, because the chamber my guide led me to was definitely a conference room. A big wooden table surrounded by chairs dominated the room, with a map of Asgard and the surrounding area hung on one wall. A group of heavily armored warriors was just leaving as we arrived, and Brand and Gustav were sitting at the table arguing about tactics for fighting the winter fey.

Gustav spotted me at the door, and snorted. “Looks like I owe you a crown, Brand.”

“Told you,” Brand replied. Then he turned to look at me, and laughed. “Looks like someone’s been enjoying his new toy. Did you at least remember to make her dispel that obstacle before she seduced you?”

“Yes,” I said shortly. I’d been up working all night, preparing the enchantments I needed to pull off this crazy plan, and I intentionally hadn’t used magic to get rid of my fatigue. Better to let word get out that the Atlantean mage was exhausted from his labors.

I reached into Alanna’s armory, and came out with a heavy metal box that I tossed onto the table. “We have a complication.”

Brand frowned at the object. “What’s this?”

“A bomb.”

It was funny the way Brand froze in the middle of opening the box. Both giant warriors tried to carefully edge away from the thing without being too obvious about it.

“Not the box, the device inside it. It was in the Spire, set up to kill anyone who tried to finish the repair job I’m working on. It isn’t Atlantean work, either. It’s disguised to look like a shard of crystal, like most of the Spire’s components, but there’s a mechanism hidden inside that’s enchanted in the Egyptian style.”

“The Lightbringers have managed to booby trap the Spire?” Brand said. He opened the lead box, and peered at the crystal inside.

“Impossible,” Gustav objected. “Anyone who gets close to that thing dies.”

“They’ve had five thousand years to study the problem,” I pointed out. “I can think of several ways to do it, so I’m not surprised they found one of them. But this isn’t recent. That thing has been in place for at least a few hundred years, and possibly a lot longer. Long enough to absorb some of the curse, so you don’t want to handle it too much.”

Brand slammed the box shut, and pushed it away.

“The box is lined with enough lead to keep it contained,” I told him. “Just don’t leave it sitting around open for hours at a time.”

“You’d better not be leading up to a plea for more time,” Gustav said, scowling at the box. “There was a major battle on the coast last night, and Hel’s fleet has established a beachhead. There are a thousand gate ships spewing undead onto our shores as we speak, and Gaea herself is trying to open a path for the Sons of Muspell to join them. We need results, not excuses.”

“You’ll get them. But if you want this done I need you to tighten up security around the Spire, so the Lightbringers can’t sneak someone in to stab me in the back while I’m working. I’m just heading out to pick up supplies, and then I’m going to be working around the clock. I need to make sure there aren’t any other traps waiting to go off if we activate the soul binding system, and then I have to finish repairing it. I’m going to have to jury-rig a replacement for the conduit router, and if you want it fast it won’t be as good as the original. I’ll probably have to go back in there and manually point it at a different soul trap every time it gets used.”

“Maybe you should leave Aphrodite back at Moon Ghost Hall while you work,” Gustav said.

“She’s bound to be a distraction,” Brand agreed.

“No, I need her to stand watch,” I disagreed. “I can’t assume your security will be perfect, and this kind of work takes too much concentration for me to be watching my back at the same time. Besides, if I’m going to camp out in a ruin for who knows how many days someone will have to cook.”

Brand gave me an incredulous look. “You’re going to make her cook for you?”

I shrugged. “Why not? I’m sure she knows how, I just have to motivate her properly. Now, if you’ll excuse me I need to get going. I’ll check back in a couple of days to give you a progress report.”

“I guess that will do,” Gustav conceded. “Work fast, wizard. The final hour is approaching.”

I left, before they could come up with any other complications. But as I followed my escort to the exit, I activated the magical bug I’d attached to the bottom of the conference table.

There was the sound of a door closing, and a few moments of silence. Then I heard Gustav’s voice.

“I still say we should grab that guy’s women. I don’t like dealing with a wizard without more leverage.”

“You haven’t seen the fortress they live in,” Brand replied. “We don’t have any teams that could assault that place, and they never leave anymore.”

“So we infiltrate,” Gustav said.

“Oh, sure, we’ll just breeze right past a clan of dark elves to kidnap a faerie princess and a half-demon witch. I’m sure that will work out perfectly. Or did you want to go for the pregnant tiger woman? Either way, I don’t have any agents in Midgard who have a prayer of pulling it off. Do you?”

“Odin gave this op gold clearance, Brand. We can get the support, we just have to ask for it. You’re just too busy sucking this guy’s dick to do what needs to be done.”

“More like you’ve got such a hateboner for wizards that you can’t stand working with one. Come on, Gustav, you’re better than this. Right now that guy is thinking we might let him go when he finishes the job, and even if we don’t he can just wait until we’re too busy fighting to keep a close eye on him and then vanish. But if we kidnap his girls when he’s already trying to deliver that just says there’s no way to make a deal with us. Do you really want to be up against an Atlantean wizard who thinks he’s got nothing to lose?”

“Fucking wizards,” Gustav grumbled. “You really believe he’s working on it?”

“Yes. I think he’s angry about the situation, but he has enough sense to know when he’s beaten. We just need to be careful not to back him into a corner.”

“Fine. I said I’d give you a week, so I’ll give you a week. But I’m going to start setting things up, just in case we have to do things my way.”

Asshole. Yeah, you go ahead and make your plans. We’ll see if you’re still alive in a week. But there was one thing there that puzzled me.

Alanna, why would Gustav think Elin is a faerie princess?

Isn’t she? Her comely form looks royal enough, and the power she wields is quite impressive for one so young. Ah, but you’ve been giving her power, haven’t you?

Yes, she has a ring that’s about as strong as what I’ve been feeding you. She’s not nearly that strong without it. I have the impression that her mother is some kind of noble, but I don’t think she’s all that prominent.

Well, then you’ve ensured she will face a warm welcome should she ever return to faerie, Alanna said. Strength and beauty are prized by the fey. Just don’t raise her up so high that she overshadows her mother.

Yeah, like I give a damn what her mother thinks. After the way she treated Elin, I was more likely to make her look bad on purpose just to spite her. But that was a thought for later.

I flew back to Moon Ghost Hall instead of walking, just to make it as hard as possible to ambush me along the way. I kept my guard up as I landed in the busy training yard and made my way to my rooms, but the only ambush waiting for me was a crowd of hot redheads.

“Daniel!” Mara exclaimed as I opened the door. She rushed across the room to envelop me in a bear hug. “Where were you? I was getting worried!”

“I told you he was fine,” Fiona chided. “If he died my sister and I would dissolve back into the hall, and that would be the end of us. So you’d know right away if our dear master had taken some reckless chance, and gotten himself killed.”

I returned Mara’s hug, and then freed one hand to muss Fiona’s hair. “Enough with the guilt trips, girl. I’m being as careful as I can. Where’s Caitlyn?”

“Fetching breakfast.”

Mara discretely sniffed at my neck, and pulled away. “What have you been doing that you look that wiped out, and don’t smell of sex?”

“Working. I’ve got a plan now, even if it does have more complications than I’d like. Fiona, how would you and Caitlyn feel about doing a bit of carefully measured violence on my behalf?”

“We’ll be happy to murder any man you point out, master. But mistress Mara would be a lot more effective.”

“I know, but she’s got a different part to play. Mara, can I get you to do some social engineering for me? I need to make sure the Lightbringers hear some particular tidbits of information about what I’m doing, without making it look like we’re trying to feed them false info. Aphrodite supposedly knows all about the seedy side of Asgard, so I figured if you put your heads together you can come up with a way to make that happen.”

“Sure, I can do that. Where is she, anyway? Did you leave her back at the Spire?”

“No, Alanna has her tied up in her bower. Alanna? Time to let her out, I think.”

As you wish.

My armor melted away, leaving Alanna kneeling at my feet with Aphrodite in her arms. The blonde goddess looked around at her new surroundings, and stretched luxuriously.

“That was wonderful, Alanna. Completely different than what the Vanir do, but so deliciously primal. Ring or no ring, I’d be happy to do that for a century or two.”

Alanna chuckled, and stroked her hair. “Glutton. Ask me again when the war is over, and matters with my wizard are more settled.”

“Perhaps I will, at that. So what are we doing now?”

“Eating breakfast,” I said. “Then you and Mara here can figure out the details on the information leaks.”

“Oh, of course,” Aphrodite said, finally sitting up. “So you’re really Mara, are you? I see your mother is being a bitch, as usual. If you free me and get me out of Asgard I’ll help you claim your immortality.”

“If I succeed at this mission I’ll get it anyway,” Mara countered.

“Oh, sweetie. Do you really think she’s going to keep her promise? She pulls the same routine with all of her daughters. She’s going to tease you with a little taste of it, and laugh when it slips through your grasp because of the curse she’s put on you. Then she’ll say you have to finish growing up before you’ll be able to hold onto it, and part of that will be getting pregnant. Only your son will end up devouring all your strength in the womb, and you’ll die giving birth.”

Mara pulled away from the beautiful goddess. “How could you know all that? Alanna, is she telling the truth?”

Alanna glanced at me, and I nodded. She shrugged, and turned her attention back to Mara. “It would not surprise me. I said nothing because I have no means to aid you, and my wizard has enough troubles of his own. Aphrodite, does she labor under the same curse as Lenore, and Risel before her?”

“It’s not quite the same,” Aphrodite said. “It looks like she’s made some improvements, to make it even harder to break. But it’s obviously the same old story. Make divine daughters to bear her monsters for her, so she doesn’t have to pay the price herself. Disgusting old savage.”

“Dad wouldn’t let her do that to me,” Mara protested.

“No? Will he quarrel with her on the eve of Ragnarok, and put his vengeance at risk?”

Mara hung her head, and clenched her fists so hard her knuckles went white. “Damn it. Is my life always going to be completely fucked up?”

Aphrodite frowned, and put a surprisingly gentle hand on Mara’s shoulder. “Hey, it will be alright. I didn’t tell you that just to twist the knife, Mara. I’ll be happy to help you out. You just need a few weeks of training in how to slip the bonds of mortality, and properly embrace your true nature. With your aspects that will be easy for you, and then you can shed that curse and ascend whether she wants you to or not.”

“You’re sure? You can really do that?”

“Well, not with these bindings on me. I need to be able to touch Chaos myself before I can show you the way. But you were planning to free me anyway, right? Just think of this as an extra incentive.”

“Thank you,” Mara said, choking up a little. “I… yeah. That’s an incentive alright. One way or another, I’ll get you out of here.”

“Wow,” Fiona breathed. She dropped to her knees, and bowed to Aphrodite. “Exalted One, will you accept this unworthy mortal’s devotion? You’re going to need a champion and some priestesses and agents once you’re free, right? Or even just some pet sluts who can admire your technique?”

“Jumping ship already?” I said dryly.

“Hey, you’re just a wizard, master. She’s a goddess.”

Aphrodite laughed. “I’m hardly going to poach you right now, silly girl. Offer a proper sacrifice when both of us are free, and I’ll consider it. Unless Daniel has plans for you?”

I shrugged. “I was planning to offer them a job when we get out of Asgard, but they don’t have to take it. Stealing them from the hall should break this obedience compulsion they’re under, so they’ll be free agents afterwards. But we’ve got a lot of work to do before we reach that point.”

“Hey, um, I didn’t mean to make it sound like we were going to turn on you like a couple of ungrateful bitches, master,” Fiona backpedaled. “We’d be happy for a place in your hall. It’s just, we have to worship someone, right? Who better than Golden Aphrodite, for a woman like me?”

“I understand, Fiona,” I assured her, albeit without saying what it was that I understood.

Caitlyn arrived then with a platter of food, and I explained the plan as we ate. Well, the parts they needed to know. I didn’t completely trust Mara or the twins, let alone Aphrodite, so I went light on details whenever I could. No need to make treachery easy.

“This is going to make me look pretty amazing,” Mara said. “I like it. But how sure are you that these chained spirits are going to go on a rampage if you free them?”

“I spent a few hours in the prison chamber trying to talk to them. Most of the animal spirits and monsters fly into a rage at the first hint of contact, so I’m pretty sure they’ll be out for revenge. The smarter prisoners seem pretty crazy, which makes them unpredictable, but I was able to talk to a few of them. So they know where they are, and who’s responsible for leaving them in that prison for the last thousand years or so. Whatever they do is probably going to be distracting.”

“They will be weak from their imprisonment,” Aphrodite said. “But with a city full of victims to devour, the more savage ones will quickly regain their power. For the most part I’ll applaud the destruction, but there are a few people I’d like to move out of the district before it happens.”

I raised an eyebrow at that. “There are people in Asgard you don’t want to see dead?”

“If anyone breaks my favorite toys, I want it to be me. Besides, I have agents. They might be useful later on, so I’d like to keep them alive for a bit longer. Please? I’ll only need an hour or two to arrange things.”

Alanna frowned at her. “Are you certain this will not make your captors suspicious? Surely they have someone keeping watch on you.”

“Oh, I turned him ages ago,” Aphrodite pronounced. “Besides, I’m not going to tell them any details. I just want to have a couple of pets moved to different playrooms, and put out one of the general alerts I’d set up in case Ragnarok caught us by surprise. When the dust settles I expect my keepers will think I was plotting with Mara.”

“That fits,” I agreed. “Alright, I think we can arrange that.”

“What will we be doing while you use yourself as bait?” Caitlyn asked. “Fiona and I need to be useful, or we might fade while you’re gone.”

“Well, first off I need you to get me a sample of someone’s blood. I don’t need much, just a spoonful or so, but it needs to be fresh when you collect it. It also needs to be real and more or less mortal, so it can’t come from anyone in Valhalla. A living human would be best, but I can make do with elf or dwarf if I need to.”

“This sounds interesting,” Fiona said. “What are you going to do with it?”

“You’ll see. Just be careful, and don’t take any chances at getting caught. Once that’s taken care of you’ve also got your own bit of deception to pull off. I need you to make it look like I’m still visiting the hall now and then, so no one wonders why you’re still around. But the truth is that Mara needs a place to stay, so you’ll be bringing her meals and doing whatever you can to help her out. I’ve also got a long shopping list I want you to take care of. I’m not going to be able to go straight home after this, and I don’t want to end up camping in the middle of some remote wilderness with nothing but the shirt on my back.”

“Where are you going to go?” Mara asked.

“Alanna and I are still looking at our options. We might hide out on another continent for a couple of weeks, or we might do something less obvious than that. I just need to make sure that if one of the Aesir checks up on the situation in Kozalin they don’t find any sign of my presence.”

Mara frowned. “So you’re just going to let the girls think you’re dead?”

“They won’t even think that’s a possibility unless some agent of the Aesir tells them, and I don’t think they’re going to take a message like that at face value,” I said. “Besides, I have a way to send them secret messages. I just need to stay away long enough for the battles here to heat up a bit more.”

“If this plan works that won’t take very long,” Mara said. “Rounding up a bunch of escaped prisoners will keep the gods too busy to strike back against dad’s beachhead. So we’ll get more troops here faster, and the whole invasion schedule will probably get moved up. I bet it won’t even be a week before the first big battle happens.”

“I suppose it isn’t a disaster if they learn of your return at that point,” Aphrodite said. “No one is going to be too shocked if an Atlantean wizard turns out to have a way to cheat death.”

“Exactly,” I said. “I just don’t want them to drag me back to Asgard and interrogate me about it. So it’s all a matter of timing. Speaking of which, Mara, you’ve seen the armies of both sides in this thing. How do you see the siege of Asgard going?”

“Siege isn’t really the right word for it. Asgard’s walls are big, but we’ve got a bunch of monsters who could knock them down. So the fortifications are mostly just going to shelter the civilians from getting swarmed by Hel’s army. The Aesir will have to use those gates of theirs to march out and meet our heavy hitters in the field, to keep them away from the walls.”

I nodded along. “That makes sense. How big is Hel’s army, anyway? Considering how long she’s been building it I figured she must have millions of undead.”

“Millions? Hah! Daniel, the einherjar have that many men, and they only take heroes. Try billions.”

I choked. “What?”

“She gets practically everyone who dies in all of Europe, North Africa or the western part of Asia, Daniel. Ever since dad was bound she’s been drafting everyone who knows anything about fighting into her army, and tapping the rest for the power to give them corporeal forms. She’s got a couple billion zombie infantry, and maybe a hundred million elites like the guys you fought in Kozalin. The einherjar are tough, but they’re going to get swarmed if they try to stand and fight.”

“I’ll say. What about the frost giants?”

“They have to eat, so it’s not as easy to get a lot of them in one place. But there are thousands of giant clans, and most of them can muster a few hundred fighters. The big ones have thousands, and they knew this was coming. They’ve got whole glaciers that were hollowed out to make warehouses for frozen supplies, they just have to move it where they need it. I figure we’ll keep getting fresh hosts of twenty or fifty thousand giants marching in from Jotunheim every few days for as long as this goes on. Same deal with the fire giants, too. Of course, dad will need to keep them on opposite sides of the field from each other.”

“Hmm. So, you’ve basically got an unlimited supply of troops, and Odin has a smaller force that gets all its casualties replaced every evening. Which means he wants to drag out the opening phase of the battle for as long as possible, and keep breaking your expeditionary forces so he can deplete your supply of elite troops. But once you can get past that phase every battle is going to be some of his forces gating out into the middle of a giant zombie swarm to try and take out a high-priority target.”

“Until we get some heavy hitters up to the city walls, and start tearing them down,” Mara said. “Then the zombies can swarm the defenders, and once they reach Valhalla they can burn the Halls and put a stop to the daily resurrections.”

“This will be the greatest battle since the fall of Atlantis,” Alanna said. “I don’t envy you your place in the line of battle, Mara, but I do wish that I could watch.”

“I’m sure it will be very exciting,” Aphrodite agreed. “I’m surprised you don’t plan to take part, Daniel. Think of the glory you could win.”

“There is no glory in war,” I said firmly. “At best it’s a grim necessity. You just enjoy watching hotheaded fools beat on each other for your amusement.”

“True,” she admitted, with an unrepentant grin. “I suppose watching you fight would be boring, anyway. Too many explosions, not enough bare muscle getting all sweaty in the sun.”

I snorted. “Yeah. And on that note, let’s get this done. I want to be back in the Spire before the Lightbringers can organize some last-ditch attempt to take me out here in the city.”

Mara and Aphrodite left soon afterwards, off to carefully drop a few words in the right ears. I sat down to write that shopping list for Fiona and Caitlyn, while they took care of the dishes and Alanna stood watch.

Let’s see, now. What were we going to need? Alanna’s trees would be in a dry, arid environment, so we’d need shade and light clothing if we spent time camping out near one. But that would mean letting the twins know one of Alanna’s bigger secrets, and after that comment to Aphrodite I suddenly wasn’t sure how much I could trust them. I’d been assuming they’d be grateful enough to have some loyalty once I got them back to Midgard, but now that didn’t seem like such a smart assumption. When I asked the Hall for all the scheming and manipulation talent it could provide, how much of that had come from the kind of woman who uses every man in her life as a disposable source of goodies?

Yeah, it might be better to limit how much they found out.

Regardless of that, having some arctic survival gear on hand would also be wise. It was all too likely that we’d end up spending some time in Europe before I could go home, for one reason or another. I was also going to need to report in to Hecate once I got out of this mess, and she might well have a mission or two for me. I could think of several things I might want to get done while I was out and about, and there were probably other opportunities she’d know about.

Assuming I made it. I wasn’t sure what my odds were, but I didn’t really like them. This plan had way too many moving parts for comfort.

I was working on contingency plans when Caitlyn poked her head in the room. “Master? That einherjar you met before is back for another visit. He says he has a message for you.”

“Great. Now what?”

My confusion lasted until I reached the sitting room, and found Nat Legap waiting nervously with his hat in his hands.

“Ah, so that’s who she meant. What brings you here today, Nat?”

“The prince drafted me to play messenger again, lord wizard. Not that I’m supposed to be under him, but a man like that has ways of getting what he wants, if you know what I mean.”

“I do. He’s been trying that with me, too, but I can only be pushed so far. I suppose he wants another meeting, then? Or has he found something else to threaten me with?”

“A meeting, milord. But, ah, I’m in a bit of a hard place here. He was dead set on convincing you to come, but I can’t help feeling something ain’t right about it. He was particular about the time, and there’s this shifty fellow he’s been talking to what don’t belong here.”

“Really? A man who isn’t an einherjar?”

“They say he’s a merchant, milord. Some kind of world wanderer what trades with other worlds. But I can’t think what the prince might want with a man like that.”

“I can. There are foreign assassins after me.”

Nat thought about it for a moment, and scowled. “That ain’t right. I might have died early, but my squad mates are all from Kozalin. I’ve heard the tales about how you fought off the zombies and ape men, and saved the city more than once. And now he’s helping some foreign bastard murder you?”

“Yeah, I didn’t think he’d go that far either. But don’t let on that you know, or he’ll think he needs to shut you up somehow. When is this meeting supposed to be?”

“Tonight, milord. At the sunset bell.”

“Well, I’m not going to be there. Tell him I said that I’m almost finished with my work for the Allfather, and I’m going to be busy with that for the next few days. After I finish I’ll be leaving Asgard, so I won’t have time for his problems.”

“That will put a bee in his bonnet,” Nat said. “I’ll do that, milord, and best of luck to you. Um, are you really going back to Midgard soon? I’ve never heard tell of a man coming back from Valhalla.”

“It’s easier when you aren’t dead,” I said. “Besides, wizards break a lot of rules. Why?”

“Well, I was just thinking, if you don’t mind breaking rules and such, and it ain’t too much trouble, maybe you could see your way to, ah, pass on this little note?”

He pulled a creased and folded envelope from his belt pouch, and clutched it in both hands.

“Is that for your wife?” I asked, astonished.

“Aye, milord. I just wanted her to know I ain’t no zombie in Hel’s army, so she won’t worry. But I warned her not to come here, just like you said. You were right about that one. There’s a guy in my band what I knew back in Kozalin, and his girl came through the door a couple days ago. He don’t seem to mind how she acts now, but I’d hate to see my Aina like that.”

I took the envelop. It clinked as he handed it over, and I raised an eyebrow.

“You’re sending her money?”

“Just a bit of mortal silver I managed to scrounge up, milord. It ain’t much, but it’s what I can do.”

“You’re in Valhalla, neck deep in horny wenches, trying to train up to fight all the forces of evil, and you’re still worried about taking care of your wife?”

He shrugged. “I know it’s till death do us part, but it ain’t easy to let go.”

“You’re a good man, Nat. I’ll make sure she gets it.”

Chapter 23

They came for me an hour before sunrise.

I’d been up all night again, rounding out the collection of magical gadgets I was relying on to make this whole plan work. But this time I was also using flesh magic to banish my fatigue, so I was fresh and ready for action.

I’d knocked off work a few minutes earlier to check my perimeter alarms, since this was one of the more likely times for a surprise attack. The detection ward I’d thrown up around the Sunspire didn’t register a thing, but that wasn’t much of a surprise. It was a conventional sort of security magic, and I’d be shocked if the Lightbringers didn’t have a counter for it.

The tiny cameras I’d hidden near the top of the spire were another story. I’d already known almost enough about light magic to make a magic eye, and Alanna had been happy to fill in the gaps in my knowledge. Then I’d figured out how to warp the detection part of the enchantment so it picked up infrared instead of visible light.

Apparently the wizards of Egypt didn’t know that much about physics, because now I could see three warm silhouettes creeping across the landscape towards the tower.

I re-checked my defensive measures as I watched them approach. I wanted as few prying eyes as possible watching this fight, so I was planning to have it inside the Spire. That would be dangerous for both sides, since so many things in here could go haywire if they were damaged. But I’d had time to make sure I was well protected against the most likely possibilities, and I was hoping to use the terrain to my advantage.

Of course, I at this point I was starting to think the only reason the Spire still existed was so the Lightbringers could use it as bait for Atlantean wizards. I’d found two more of those traps as I prepared for this fight, and who knew how many more there were? From their point of view I was standing in a trap they’d prepared ages ago, where their activities would be conveniently hidden from the gods of Asgard.

In a few minutes we’d find out whose preparations were better. But before that, there was another puzzle I was hoping to see resolved. I’d known perfectly well that Gustav’s attempts at security wouldn’t make any difference, just like the ward. My hope was that seeing a series of reasonable defenses that they could penetrate would keep the assassins from wondering too much about what new and unexpected surprises I might have in store.

But their next challenge was Aphrodite.

She’d grumbled quite a bit when I put her on sentry duty, instead of letting her continue playing with Alanna in the dryad’s bower. But Alanna had convinced her to put some effort into it, and now there was a copy of her lounging around at each of the half dozen locations where one could easily enter the Spire. Several of the aspects Alanna had unbound had to do with perception, so sneaking past her without being spotted would be quite a feat.

Apparently they weren’t even going to try. The lead assassin faded into view near one of the more accessible entrances, revealed by a hidden camera I hadn’t told Aphrodite about. He said something in a language that I guessed was probably Ancient Greek, and bowed.

Aphrodite laughed, and replied in the same language. Then she made a sweeping gesture towards the entrance, and ostentatiously went back to staring off into the distance.

The Lightbringer invoked Ra’s ancient agreement with Zeus, for the destruction of any remaining trace of Atlantis, Alanna said. Aphrodite agreed to honor the treaty, and wished him luck on his mission.

“Well, at least now I know,” I said as I watched the invisible assassins ghost past her. “I figured they’d be in contact with her, since she’s such a useful source of information. It’s too bad she decided to backstab us, but I suppose I shouldn’t be surprised. Even if I die, she can probably still talk Mara into freeing her.”

True, but I must admit to being disappointed. I had hoped her long trial here might teach her something.

I was about to say something about old dogs and new tricks when Aphrodite pulled out the prototype communicator I’d given her, and pushed the talk button.

“Well, Daniel, your predictions have proven as astute as ever. They just entered the northern breach, and they’re making their way deeper into the Spire as I speak. I hope your preparations prove adequate, for they’ve send a senior team after you.”

It took me a moment to figure out how to respond to that.

“So I see. You didn’t feel like putting up any resistance?”

“Have you mistaken me for one of your battle maniacs, Daniel? I am no war goddess, and I’ve already died quite enough painful deaths for one millennium. Besides, I wouldn’t want to deny you the glorious death that you’ve worked so hard to arrange.”

“You’re all heart, Aphrodite.”

“Aren’t I? Now that my part in this play is done, may I retire from the field of battle? It would be tragic if I stayed too long, and was caught up in your grand finale.”

“Sure. Alanna?”

The steel breastplate covering my chest vanished back into Alanna’s armory for a moment, so she could poke her head out of the wood beneath it and speak.

“Your work here is done, Aphrodite. Make your way unseen to Mara’s side, and we shall join you when we may. And… thank you.”

“What, did you think I would turn on you so easily? When have I ever been so obvious, Alanna? If I ever stab you in the back it will come as a complete surprise.”

“Magnificent bitch,” Alanna replied, with an affectionate smile on her lips. “Go on, then. Run away, and keep your pretty hide intact.”

“Ooh, are you looking to make some fresh marks of your own on my sexy butt? I’ll be waiting for you, Mistress Alanna. Good luck!”

I couldn’t resist the urge to facepalm. “She never stops, does she?”

She would turn being devoured by dragons into some disturbing innuendo, Alanna agreed, switching back to our silent telepathy. Now, tell me again why we must fight these hunters, instead of simply retreating and letting them die in the destruction you have planned?

“Someone will check for signs of a battle,” I said. “The more high-end magic these guys have to use, the more obvious it will be who they were and what they were doing. With any luck this will drive a wedge between Asgard and the Lightbringers, and ensure they don’t cooperate in the future. Besides, I need to see how my new gear stacks up against them.”

I stood, and picked up the staff I’d left leaning against the wall next to my improvised security console. It was constructed from dozens of individual magic items, just like my new cloak and surcoat. An outer shell of tungsten layered with defensive enchantments protected a tube lined with enchanted rings, ready to turn anything passing through them into a hypervelocity projectile. The conjuration rods at the base were set to make fire, water or nickel-iron spheres, with or without the enchantments I’d come up with.

It was by far the most dangerous of my new weapons, powerful enough that I’d have to be careful how I used it inside the spire. But I had other options. My gloves protected the backs of my hands with the same sort of shield array as my cloak, while the palms were set with enchanted disks that would set off attack spells on command. Grinder sat at its usual place on my belt, next to an assortment of little iron balls meant to be used as grenades, and the revolver at my other hip had several new ammunition types.

Hopefully it would be enough.

The magic I’d come up with for relaying a camera view back to a central location was still pretty clunky, and I’d only been able to connect a limited number of them. But the passages that wound through the tower’s mechanisms had a lot of choke points, so I was able to track the progress of the intruders well enough. They obviously had a map of the interior, because they made directly for the soul transfer system. Presumably they were hoping to catch me in the middle of working enchantments, and hit me by surprise.

I watched with anticipation as they approached the one corridor where I’d set a trap for them, wondering if it would work. But they proved to be as good as I’d feared. The group abruptly stopped well before they reached my little minefield, and huddled for a moment. Then they linked hands, and vanished from my view.

Teleportation? Or did they transform into something my camera couldn’t see? I wished I had a better monitoring system, but there was no sense worrying about it now. There weren’t any cameras deeper in, so instead I made my way to the position I’d chosen for my counter-ambush.

It was really just a gap between two of the crystalline machines that filled most of the tower, but part of the floor had been torn open by an explosion at some point in the past. That gave me a clear line of sight to the spot where I’d be working if I was really going to fix the rod for Odin. I’d even set up a decoy there, a flesh dummy wearing an imitation of my armor that was bent over a length of enchanted crystal. Magic played around it, doing nothing in particular but hopefully giving an impression of a wizard at work.

My staff had basic iron sights, just like any rifle, so I set it for a medium-power explosive shot and took careful aim. Then I settled in to wait.

A minute passed. Two. Five. How long would it take them to get down here, anyway? Even if they took it slow, it shouldn’t be much longer.

Something is amiss, Alanna said. They should have taken the bait by now.

That was all the warning I had before a mass of biting insects engulfed me.

The initial attack didn’t penetrate my defenses, of course. Alanna had shifted into a suit of full plate that covered me from head to toe, and even the spots where most armor would have gaps were protected. My helmet was completely sealed, with thick quartz vision slits to let me see out. Flexible bark covered my armpits, the backs of my knees and other spots that needed to flex, with a layer of steel mail over that wherever there was room.

But the horde of golden scarab beetles that had descended on me was obviously magical. Their black jaws gnawed at both the substance of my armor and the magic protecting it, and their wings let them reach my whole body at once.

I pulled one of the grenades off my belt, and tossed it over my shoulder. An eruption of water gushed out, filling the whole chamber in an instant. A heartbeat later the water heated to boiling, making me glad for Alanna’s climate control magic. The beetles thrashed frantically, but I didn’t wait to see if it killed them. I pushed forward, force blades sprouting from the knuckles of my gloves, and widened the hole in front of me enough to dive through.

A torrent of boiling water came along with me, of course, and the grenade was still pumping out more. I hit the floor and tumbled for a moment, before I got my flight magic active and rose into the air. A burst of force magic blew away the few beetles that were still clinging to my armor, and I took a quick look around the larger chamber where I’d been hoping to catch the assassins.

There weren’t any humans here, but a huge centauroid monster was waiting for me. It had too many legs to count, and four long arms that ended in sharp points. It’s whole body was covered in plates of black armor, and it was fast. Before I could finish getting my bearings its mandibles spread wide, and a swirling beam of dark purple energy erupted from its mouth.

The bolt of magical energy struck me in the chest, and slammed me across the room to crash into a crystalline column. But the layered wards on my surcoat held, and the dispel field unraveled the hostile magic that tried to cling to me before it could do anything else.

I leveled my staff at the monster, and returned fire with a spray of bullets that were bigger and much faster than the ones my revolver fired. It still wasn’t enough, though. They glanced off the armored plates that covered the thing’s body, leaving cracks and dents but failing to penetrate.

It rushed me in a blur of motion, an ominous ruby glow forming around the tips of its pointed limbs, and I didn’t have time to think of another plan. I cranked the power up with a thought, turning on all the acceleration rings, and the staccato cracks of bullets became a thunderous roar of sound. The monster blew apart into a spray of black ichor and mangled body parts.

My staff was enchanted to transfer the recoil of high-velocity shots to the surrounding terrain, and I saw an ominous web of cracks in the crystal out of the corner of my eye. But I didn’t have time to evaluate that, or the craters my shots had made in the wall behind the monster, because I was already under attack from another source.

Fire filled the room, raging against my force field without penetrating, but completely obscuring my vision. I lifted into the air, starting to move away from the impact crater I’d left, when something struck me in the back and sent me tumbling forward. A couple more impacts followed the first, but whatever they were didn’t even come close to penetrating my cloak.

Countering fire with water would be too obvious against these guys, so instead I triggered another of the devices on my belt. A force bubble formed just outside my wards, and expanded to form a bubble of near-vacuum that quickly filled the chamber. The fire went out, revealing a giant glowing worm floating in the air.

I dialed the power on my staff back down and fired off a burst at it. It died a lot more easily than the last monster, its body not nearly as well armored.

“Where are they getting these things?” I grumbled.

I did warn you they like to put demons in bottles, Daniel. Don’t stay in one place for so long.

I moved, dropping the force bubble and looking for some clue about where the assassins were. They were still invisible, and even though they were obviously loaded down with magic items they didn’t show up at all on my mage sight. The area was too hot now for my thermal vision to be much use, but I’d also put together a force magic enchantment that detected motion. Hopefully that was exotic enough that they wouldn’t have a counter for it.

I moved into the main corridor leading out of the ambush room, only to blunder into a trap. A brilliant flash of light blinded me for a moment, despite the primitive attempt at glare protection I’d built into my helmet lenses. Chains of blue-white light sprang out of the walls to wrap around me, and sparks danced along my wards. My outer force field collapsed, and the dispel field beneath it surged and swirled as it fought against some kind of mana drain effect from the chains.

I swiped at the chains with my force claws, but the conflicting magics just sparked and flashed against each other without either force yielding. Then I caught a flash of motion from just down the corridor. Something small and fast smashed into my faceplate, and one of the lenses cracked.

Crap. That was still one of the weak spots in my defenses, and these guys were probably good enough to hit me in the eyes consistently. No time to be fancy, then. I set of another prepared spell, that filled the space around me with a whirling vortex of plasma and force blades patterned after Grinder’s blade, and then ramped up the power on my flight magic and launched myself down the hall.

The chains still didn’t break, but my wards had kept them from getting a firm grip on me. The howling shriek of my destruction sphere filled my ears, and my upper body slipped free of the chains under a thrust that could have lifted a tank. I had a moment to be glad that I’d thought to make that flight spell distribute the thrust across my body instead of delivering it all to one location, or else the stress would have torn my legs off.

Then something gave. A cloud of the little titanium shields covering my armor broke free from the force magic that was supposed to hold them in place, and flew off into the vortex around me. But the chains lost their grip, and I found myself careening down the hall for a moment before I slammed into another wall.

Had I heard a scream? The plasma vortex was so loud I couldn’t be sure, but it seemed like I’d flown right over the position of the guy who’d been throwing things at me.

I peeled myself out of the crater I’d made, and let the vortex fade away as I moved to a new position. There was lighting playing along the walls of the wrecked corridor, and even with my armor’s insulation I didn’t want to be there for long.

This time nothing happened for a few seconds.

“Playing tag with these guys in a maze of hallways gives them too much advantage,” I decided. “Let’s try plan dark.”

Yes, let us hunt these hunters of men, Alanna agreed. I dislike playing the part of prey.

I triggered another spell, and the corridor was plunged into darkness. The temperature dropped quickly as well, and the crackle of lightning faded away. I’d planted a whole network of connected devices around this part of the Spire, hidden amid wrecked machines where they wouldn’t be easy to spot, all designed to spread this same darkness effect.

The spell ate every photon of visible light that entered its area of effect, rendering even the best night vision useless, and the sound dampening would interfere with echolocation. Cold and darkness are commonly associated with necromancy, so I was hoping they’d assume this was the prelude to some nasty wide-area spell. I wasn’t sure how they’d respond, but the obvious solutions that occurred to me mostly involved breaking the darkness somehow.

Obviously that would give away their positions. But even if they had a less blatant option, they’d still be at a disadvantage. I’d carefully designed the darkness to eat only visible light, and not infrared. As the heat of the opening engagement faded away, and the magical cold took effect, the glow of our body heat would become more and more visible.

I floated soundless through the empty halls, looking for a sign of their presence. Body heat, magical disturbances, interference with the darkness field. Anything that would give away their position. Unfortunately I hadn’t counted on the number of friends they’d brought to the party.

Giant slime monsters. Animated gas clouds. Vicious-looking golems made of steel and bone. Another of those giant centaur things. The first few things that I encountered couldn’t see me through the darkness, but at the rate they were tossing out exotic menaces it was only a matter of time before that changed. Even the monsters that flailed around blindly were restricting my movements, unless I wanted to give away my own position by fighting one.

Then an anti-teleport ward unfolded over the area.

It seems that they think us trapped, Alanna commented.

“Yeah. Which means they’ll be trying to close off escape routes. I bet one of them is headed for the teleportarium.”

I ducked into a side corridor, circling a mass of broken crystal and dropping through a hole into the main shaft of the sun tap. The harsh glare of solar plasma drove the darkness away and washed out my heat vision, but I didn’t need it here. I dove down the shaft, hurrying towards the lower chambers.

Until a whip of flame lashed out from the main column to smack me in the face.

My force fields held, but even so the heat was sweltering. I dodged away, throwing up a larger bubble of force around myself to keep the heat at bay, and looked around wildly. Was someone controlling the plasma? There was so much magic in here that it would be hard to spot an animation spell.

But apparently it was another creature. A ball of eye-searing brilliance detached itself from the column that dominated the room, lashing out with whip-like limbs of plasma as it followed me. My helmet lenses darkened against the glare, and I leveled my staff at it. What should I use, though? Water would make a hell of a steam explosion, but earth might not disrupt this thing’s form. A dispel blast, maybe?

In my moment of hesitation there was a burst of magic behind me, and a massively powerful dispelling blew down my force bubble. A wave of ethereal energy engulfed me, flowing like water, eating away at the magic of my wards like acid. The fire monster pounced, like it had been waiting for the opportunity, and got one of its whip-like limbs around my waist.

“Enough with the fucking minions!”

Neither threat was tangible enough to pin me in place, so I spun to see where the new attack had come from. Sure enough there was one of the assassins clinging to the side of the shaft, holding out a rod that gushed forth a stream of smoky white magic-eating fog.

I leveled my staff at him, and he changed his aim point to cover it with the fog. But the protective enchantments on the outside of the weapon held the attack at bay for a moment, and that was all I needed to switch settings. Water lance, ten percent power, continuous beam.

That mode was supposed to make a thin needle of water moving at several times the speed of sound, held together by a temporary force magic enchantment. Perfect for cutting walls, monsters and other obstacles into pieces even at long ranges. The fog ate away the enchantment as the beam left my staff, turning the needle of water into a firehose spray, but that just made it harder to dodge.

Somehow he actually managed to start moving in the tiny fraction of second before the jet hit him, but it didn’t make any difference. The impact smashed his left leg to a pulp, slamming him into the wall of the shaft and shattering the crystal there. I played the jet over his body, and a cloud of debris momentarily hid it. Then some capacitor in the machinery I’d smashed him into discharged, and a brilliant flash of lightning momentarily blinded me.

I rose above the fire monster, and swept the water jet over one of its limbs. It jerked away, releasing me to flee back towards the column of solar plasma in the middle of the shaft. But I only got a glimpse of that, because my vision was going dark.

“What the hell?”

It’s a soot demon, Daniel. Their bodies are like a cloud of dust, and it’s sticking to us. I’m afraid fire and explosions won’t arm this beast.

I had to shut off the water jet to make sure I didn’t hit the sun tap by accident. “Great. What does?”

Death magic is best, but we don’t have any. Cold makes them more solid, and acid might work. Do hurry, it’s already trying to work its way into the seams of my shell. If it touches flesh it can turn a man to dust in moments.

A wash of heat warned me that the living fireball was back for another try.

“How the fuck am I going to make it cold in here?” I grumbled.

I cut the lift on my flight spell, and let myself fall out from under the monster’s attacks. There weren’t any crosswinds in here, and the fire beast wasn’t tangible enough to actually move me, so I ought to fall straight down the shaft without drifting into the column of solar plasma in the middle. I’d better be right about that, because even my fancy new defenses weren’t going to protect me from that level of heat.

How should I know? You’re the wizard of invention here, Daniel. Do something impossible.

My cloak was on fire, shedding shield segments as its enchantments unraveled. My surcoat was mostly intact, but my armor glowed red hot in places. My hands, which had less protection than the rest of me, were only working because my healing amulet was fixing them as fast as they burned. And she wanted me to come up with some brilliant improvisation now?

Well, maybe there was a way. I reached into the enchantments on my staff, working through the intent control conduit I’d left open for myself. If I could just tweak the way the water conjuration worked…

I hit the bottom of the shaft.

My armor took most of the impact, but it still rattled my teeth. I bounced across the hard surface and came to rest on my back, with a new collected of bruises and wrenched joints to keep my healing amulet busy.

“I’m really getting tired of this shit,” I grumbled. “Next time I get into a fight, I want to do it from the commander’s seat of a tank.”

I threw a large force bubble over myself, working blind because my faceplate was still covered with black dust. Where was my staff? I reached, and triggered the return enchantment. It flew through the air to slap into my palm, and I pointed it straight up.

An impact slammed into my throat, and something sharp just managed to prick me through Alanna’s protection.

Cursed blade, Alanna gasped. Another assassin is on us, Daniel!

I didn’t waste any more time. I triggered my staff, and a dense cone of snow and hail shot out of it. Naturally it just bounced off the inside of the force bubble, and rebounded to bury me. The hot metal of my armor melted the first of it that hit me, at which point the fact that it wasn’t just water ice became apparent.

I heard a startled cry from the assassin as he found himself drenched in a half-liquid slush of sulfuric acid. It didn’t stop him from trying to drive a knife through the cracked lens of my faceplate, but the quartz held.

I unleashed a wide-angle force blast in his general direction, and rolled over. The slush quickly grew deep enough to bury me, and the black coating on my lenses started to dissolve.

See? I knew you’d think of something. This stings a bit, but with the healing you’ve gifted me it’s no great matter.

Yeah, my armor was damaged enough that liquid was seeping in through gaps in the force fields, and the metal shell wasn’t completely watertight. I tossed out a couple of bouncer grenades to keep the assassin busy, and then took a few seconds to rub at the goop. It came away reluctantly, leaving me with a blurry view through damaged lenses.

I’d left my staff running, so I was completely submerged in acid slush by then. It hissed and bubbled where it touched my armor, but dissolving thick metal takes a while even at room temperature. As the metal cooled the reactions slowed down as well, so the damage might not be too bad.

Oh, who was I kidding? This armor was toast. I guess losing my gear was an improvement over getting chopped to bits, like some of my previous fights. But I’d been hoping things would go better than this.

Nothing was attacking me, but there was no way a little acid and a force blast took out one of these guys. The way they were throwing out heavy-duty enchantments and major summonings, they had to have good defenses too. I wouldn’t be surprised if they all had healing on a par with mine, and the injured ones were just lying low and regenerating. So why wasn’t anyone attacking me?

Perhaps they don’t have anything suited to a fight in half-frozen acid? Alanna suggested. But they know exactly where we are now, and they’ve already laid out anti-teleport wards. Most likely they’re unleashing more demons, and preparing to attack the moment we emerge from the snowball.

“Probably. Will the wards cause you any trouble?” I asked.

Hardly. I was already here, so their ward merely settled around my connection to my bower. Does this mean you’re done fighting?

“Yeah. Time to quite while I’m ahead, for once. Next time we need to fight these guys, remind me to just pull out and nuke the site from orbit.”

I don’t know what that means, but you can explain later. Hurry, now. They won’t wait forever.

The circlet I wore under my helmet needed about twenty seconds to work, and it wasn’t a fun process. It started with a prickling on my scalp, and a dull sense of nausea. Then the pain hit, like needles being stabbed through my eyes. I gritted my teeth, and rode it out. My vision swam, and an uncomfortable pins and needles feeling swept up my limbs. Then there was a final stab of pain as everything was torn away.

I floated in numb darkness for a long moment. If I’d made a mistake in my enchantment this was going to suck. Although, now that I thought about it, I could still feel my connection to Alanna.

Then came another wave of grinding agony, as I was shoved and compressed into a too-small space. Nausea again, and a vague phantom limb feeling that immediately erupted into serious pins and needles. I curled into a ball of misery, and groaned. 

“There, there,” Alanna said, patting me on the back. “It will pass in a few moments. You’ll need more practice to make it a smooth transition.”

“I don’t ever want to do that again,” I said. “I guess I’ll have to at some point, but ugh. Body swapping sucks.”

My eyes opened, and I found myself looking down at an unfamiliar pair of hands. I had a sample of my own blood stashed in Alanna’s bower, for when I was ready to go home. But the body I was going to use for the rest of this caper was based on an entirely different source, just to minimize the chance of some divination saying that Daniel Black was still alive.

“It gets easier with time. But I think it was wise of you to arrange matters so that you don’t need to move for a bit. Did the rest of your plan work?”

My new body wore a gold circlet, which was still connected to the one on my old body back inside the Spire. I checked the complex enchantment woven into it, and confirmed that it was working as expected.

“The countdown is running,” I said. “Help me get to the viewscreen.”

Chapter 24

Young dryads can only turn into a single wooden object, like a shield or spear. As they gain experience some of them learn to become a suit of armor, with multiple parts that are all connected to their metaphysical selves. The most powerful ones can even separate their parts a bit, and choose which one they emerge from when they resume humanoid form.

Alanna had mastered those tricks before men discovered agriculture, and gone on to pioneer new feats unheard of for any normal dryad. She’d been amused when I proposed using a ball of her wood as the core and control mechanism for an unconventional golem. Keeping it manifested and connected to her bower had been no trouble at all for her, even when it was miles away, and that mystic link gave me a channel for my own magic.

Now I stumbled to the control panel that we’d stashed in her bower, and put my hands on the wooden ball that carried the control enchantments. My magic merged with Alanna’s, linking with the enchantments we’d forged on this fragment of herself. The ancient dryad eagerly embraced the connection, happy to submerge herself in it until she became an extension of my will. For a moment the sleek huntress draped against my back was mine to command, as easily as I moved my own hands.

The state of union flowed down the connection to the ball of wood in the golem, and out into the enchanted steel around the core. Then the golem was mine to command as well.

Once the connection was established Alanna pulled away slightly, taking back a bit of her own volition. “I shall watch over your new body, my wizard,” she breathed into my ear. “Good luck with Mara’s hunt.”

“Thanks,” I said, patting her arm. She settled into place behind me, her arms around my waist, and I had to take a moment to savor the warmth of her embrace. The post-battle rush seemed stronger than usual in this new body, which probably shouldn’t have been a surprise. But we didn’t have time to waste.

I reached out across a gap of unknown miles and dimensions to activate the golem, and settle my awareness firmly inside it. The cameras activated, and I levitated out of the leather pouch I found myself in. Mara looked down at the movement.

“That you, stud?” She asked.

“It’s me,” I confirmed, speaking through the golem. Its voice was designed to sound like a young boy, which was a little disconcerting. But replicating my own voice would have been a dumb mistake.

“The show is about to start,” I went on. “Wait a minute, where are you?”

I spun the golem in place, taking in the view. She was crouched on a rooftop, with Caitlyn and Fiona at her sides. A predawn glow was just beginning to light the eastern sky, but it was still too dark for me to recognize any of the buildings around us.

“A few blocks over from the prison,” Mara answered. “I wanted to make sure we can move fast once this distraction of yours happens. Speaking of which, isn’t it supposed to be soon?”

“The timer’s about to hit zero, and you’re on a fucking roof? Damn it, we need cover! Girls, grab hold of me now. Which way is the Spire from here?”

The count reached zero, and my question became superfluous. The headband send a signal to the remote detonator I’d inserted into the Spire’s self-destruct device, telling it to do its job. Then it banished itself, leaving no traces behind for an investigator to find.

For a moment, nothing happened. Then a brilliant glow welled up somewhere far to the south. I spun to face it, and threw up the strongest force barrier the golem could make.

Far in the distance I could see the Sunspire being torn apart by a thread of terrible brilliance. It lashed violently back and forth, shredding the crystal machine that had kept it bound for so long and sending steamers of flame into the sky. Great explosions sent shards of magitech machinery flying, and jets of golden fire began to leak out. Then the thread came unbound, and blossomed into a titanic ball of fire so bright it washed out my golem’s cameras for a moment.

"Whoa,” Mara breathed. “That’s a big-”

The shock wave hit us just as my vision was coming back. The rooftops in front of me exploded into a roiling mass of debris that slammed into my shield. The barrier flared into visibility, a bright orange glow outlining its carefully angled shape, with brighter flashes erupting whenever an especially large object struck it.

I’d designed this golem to act as an assistant for Mara in her effort to free the Fenris wolf, and its combat functions were almost as overpowered as the staff I’d just lost. The barrier shed the force of the blast easily, but the roof the girls were standing on was another story. It came apart just like all the others, and then there was nothing to anchor the barrier to.

Our whole group went flying.

Fortunately Caitlyn and Fiona had listened, and grabbed hold of my golem before the flash blinded them. We tumbled through the air together, crashing through obstacles as I shrank the force bubble around us, and finally fetched up against a wall of heavy stone. Rubble and broken timbers quickly buried us, but my shield easily took the weight.

“Ow,” Mara groaned, pushing herself upright. “That was a little too exciting.”

“I think my arm is broken,” Caitlyn whimpered.

Fiona wasn’t even that coherent. She just clutched her head, and moaned in pain.

Not surprising, since unlike Mara they were just normal girls. I was glad they’d survived the ordeal at all. If the explosion had killed them their souls would be called back to Moon Ghost Hall, and I had no idea if I could get them back before they got broken down and remade.

“There was a reason I wanted you to wait on the other side of that hill, Mara,” I said. “The terrain would have protected you from the blast, and the twins wouldn’t have gotten hurt.”

“Shit. I’m sorry, girls. Fiona, are you alright?”

Fiona’s only reply was a dazed moan of pain. I reached out with a tendril of flesh magic, and muted the pain while I checked on her condition. Concussion, a fractured skull and a broken ankle she hadn’t even noticed yet? Ouch.

“Try to remember that not everyone is as tough as we are. Girls, I think it’s about time I got you two free.”

“Please,” Caitlyn said. “Take us away from this awful place, and keep us safe until you need us.”

“Yeah, I’m really sorry about this,” Mara said. “Look, why don’t I handle the first part of this? To apologize for fucking up. No reason to get you two hurt even more with some magic tug of war, when I can slip you free as easy as pie. Ready, Daniel?”

“Um, sure, we can do it that way. Ready.”

As much time as I’d spent studying Atlantean soul traps, building my own version hadn’t been hard. Mara brushed her hand over Caitlyn’s head, and her connection to Moon Ghost Hall vanished like a dream. Her body turned translucent, starting to fade away as the divine magic that maintained it faded. But it only took a moment to trigger the soul trap I’d built into the golem. In a flash she was sucked into it, carried through the conduit back to Alanna’s bower and safely stored away in one of the soul traps there.

Unlike the Atlantean version, mine immediately put her to sleep. She’d wake up when I was safely away from Asgard, and had time to make a real body for her.

Without a soul to hold it together the form she’d been inhabiting lost cohesion, and dissolved back into raw mana in a matter of moments. Mara frowned at the spectacle. “Was that supposed to happen?”

“Yeah, I’ve got her. Their bodies aren’t real, so they fade really fast once they’re not being used anymore. Let’s finish this up.”

She nodded, and freed Fiona as easily as she had Caitlyn. I stored her soul, and breathed a sigh of relief. I’d been a little worried about them.

“All done,” I said. “They’re safe with Alanna now.”

“Good. Okay, so, ready to start this act?”

The plan was to pretend that the little golem I was driving was Mara’s creation, rather than mine. I’d designed its combat functions to look different that my usual spells, more like something a demigoddess of fire might come up with. As long as I played the part, any witness who saw us should come away thinking Mara was a prodigy at wizardry in addition to her other talents, and had made herself an assistant.

I floated the golem up to hover above her left shoulder. “Ready, mistress. Did you settle on a name?”

She rolled her eyes. “Ugh, just call me Mara, okay? That mistress crap is embarrassing. You said this thing has an awesome fire attack, right?”

“Well, I haven’t been able to test fire it, but it should be pretty impressive.”

“Right, then I’ll call you Sunstrike. Can you get this crap off of our heads?”

Sunstrike. Right. Note to self, Mara goes for the pretentious names. Well, she was young, and she didn’t grow up on anime and video games like I did. It probably sounded cool to her.

“No problem, Mara,” I assured her. “Let’s see what’s going on out there.”

It only took a moment to angle the force field I was projecting, and let most of the debris slide off. Then I let it drop, and Mara climbed out of the mass of broken beams that remained. I floated along at her shoulder, reminding myself not to act too intelligent where people could see us.

We emerged to a scene of devastation. All of the buildings around us had gotten their upper floors destroyed by the explosion, and many had completely collapsed. A lot of people had survived, but they were still dazed with shock. Here and there I saw an elf healing the injured, or digging someone out of a collapsed building. But the humans were mostly too stunned to do anything but stare at the destruction.

A long, incredibly loud shrieking roar sounded out, sending the people scurrying for cover. Mara grinned, and bounded to the top of the highest building on the block that was still standing. I followed her up, and gazed out over the ruins.

Where the Spire had stood an enormous mushroom cloud now dominated the landscape, its brightly glowing top still rising into the air. Several square miles of the city had been flattened by the blast, and thousands of fires had sprung up amid the ruins. As nukes go the detonation had been relatively small, but a few dozen kilotons is still a hell of an explosion.

Not everything near ground zero had died, though. Souls are immaterial, so the blast that destroyed the soul prison had done no real harm to the prisoners. The trapped mortals would all be ghosts now, mad spirits wandering the streets looking for vulnerable targets to possess. But the stronger prisoners, the gods and divine monsters, weren’t so limited. One way or another, a lot of them would have ways to reform their bodies.

Case in point, a creature that looked like a mutated Tyrannosaurus Rex the size of an office building was emerging from the mushroom cloud. Rows of spikes jutted from its skull, running all the way down its back to a thagomizer at the end of its tail, and lightning danced among the body protrusions. As I watched it breathed out a cone of lighting that enveloped several blocks of half-wrecked buildings, clinging to the broken stone and eating into it like acid.

Overhead, something like a gigantic jellyfish was coalescing from the smoke. A tracery of sickly yellow light lit its translucent body, running down the tentacles that dangled hundreds of feet below it to brush against the ground. Some of the tentacles vomited out blobs of viscous slime that moved on their own, flowing out into the ruins like predators searching for prey. Others groped among the remaining buildings, starting to tear open the few structures that were still standing.

Dozens of smaller apparitions darted through the air, glowing with strange magics that I couldn’t make sense of at this distance. Some of them had to be gods, busily creating new bodies for themselves, while others were probably demons. But to be so obvious at this distance, all of them were stronger than the things I’d been fighting in the tower.

A swan flew down from the cloudy skies, and became Aphrodite. She perched lightly on a broken column next to the one Mara stood on, and laughed. “You certainly know how to show a girl a good time!”

“Don’t we?” Mara agreed. “No one is going to pay any attention to us with all this going on. Are you coming with me for the rest of it?”

“I wouldn’t miss it for the world. Show me your power, and I’ll show you my gratitude when we’re safe in your father’s camp.”

Mara blushed. “Yeah, I just bet you will. Come on.”

She took flight, using the ring I’d given her just yesterday like she’d had it all her life. I stuck with her, holding position over her right shoulder, and Aphrodite became a bird again to follow us.

I was more ambivalent about the destruction than my companions. The death toll here might end up rivaling what I’d done to the andregi when all was said and done, and this time most of the fallen would be civilians. They’d never done anything to me, and I doubted most of them even knew about the shitty things their gods did.

But that’s the nature of war. Maybe a world-spanning hyperpower with no serious rivals could afford to dick around with carefully limited strikes and avoiding civilian casualties, but that wasn’t an option here. When you’re the underdog you don’t have the luxury of such delicate morals. You either fight back with the tools you have, or you bend over and let your enemies do what they want with you.

Besides, these were the people who thought holding a weekly tournament to see who got to rape Aphrodite next was great entertainment. If the choice was between killing them or letting Odin’s men torture my girls, I wasn’t going to hesitate.

It didn’t take long to find the prison. The massive structure of fused stone was miles away from ground zero, and had easily weathered the blast that devastated the rest of the neighborhood. The surrounding garden was a mess, but it seemed largely deserted. We approached from the rear of the building to stay out of sight of the sentries at the door.

“Looks like they haven’t sent any reinforcements this way,” Mara commented as we flew up. “Good, that will make this easy. Stay back a bit, Aphrodite. This is going to get loud.”

Mara flew across the park, and stopped directly above the prison. Instead of tile or shingles it was a seamless dome of blank gray stone, with no sign of doors or weak points.

“Hit it, Sunstrike!” Mara ordered, her voice loud and clear.

I put my crosshairs on the roof a few dozen yards ahead of us, and activated the golem’s primary weapon.

Deep inside the golem a set of conjuration rods fired, creating a firehose stream of water and saturating it with spells. One to hold it together in a tight beam, and another to carry a powerful dispelling that would be released when it struck something solid. Then the water passed through an enchanted ring that heated it with fire magic, while compressing it and accelerating it out the front of the barrel. After the first ring was another bearing the same enchantment, and then another.

One ring was enough to turn the water into a lance of steam. I’d managed to fit twelve of them into the golem. What emerged from the business end of the weapon was a dense beam of superheated plasma that split the gloom with a brilliant yellow glare.

It slammed into the roof like the fist of an angry god, making a thunderclap that would have deafened me if I were there in person. Runic wards flared and died in an instant, overwhelmed by the sheer concentrated energy of the attack. The golem’s force anchor struggled to hold it in place against the incredible recoil, but it didn’t have to work for very long because the stone surface shattered under the impact. Glowing, half-molten fragments of rock flew up to shower the area, bouncing off the force wall I’d spread to protect us.

In a few moments I was through the roof. I played the beam in a circle, making a hole big enough for Mara’s monster form to fit through easily, and then turned off the beam.

The edges of the hole glowed bright orange, dripping trickles of molten stone here and there. It cut through eight feet or so of solid stone, and then several floors worth of tangled passages. As I watched space seemed to twist around it, turning what had been a straight bore into a wandering tunnel through the maze.

“Good start,” Mara said. “Hit it again.”

I dropped into the hole to give my force anchor more to work with, and engaged the beam again.

The noise was horrific, and I’m sure the heat was even worse. But my golem was protected by two inches of enchanted steel and a force wall that could laugh off naval artillery. The smoke and heat had no effect on it at all, and I quickly chewed my way through the maze. The interior walls were no obstacle to this level of force, and the enchantments that were supposed to confuse and misdirect intruders fell apart under the barrage of dispellings.

Every few floors I turned off the beam for a moment to get a look at where I was going. The fourth time I did that I found another mass of solid stone in front of me, with a glowing spot marking where the beam had struck. It was a different kind of stone, heavy and dark, saturated with divine magic.

Mara crowded up behind me, and peered at the barrier. “Orichalcum? Awesome! We’re almost through, little buddy. Give it everything you’ve got!”

I did.

This time my plasma beam crashed into the barrier and rebounded, smashing through the walls of the maze around us. Strange, insectoid creatures fled from the destruction, or died shrieking when their hiding places were shattered under a hail of molten rock. Dwarven runes flared to life, covering the surface of the final barrier in dense patterns of protection, and a heavy smoke of soot and stone vapor poured up through the gaping chasm I’d made.

For a moment I worried about Mara’s ability to survive the backblast, but I needn’t have worried. She was a demigoddess of fire, and the protections I’d given her warded off the smoke and debris easily enough. She bounced in delight, brushing a blob of lava off her cheek and shouting at the top of her lungs.

“More! More! Hit it harder, it’s starting to give!”

I reached into my weapon’s enchantment, adjusting the feed rate of the water up and down. Using just a trickle of water gave me a violet beam of thin but superheated plasma, hot enough to melt anything. A heavier flow gave me a dense, orange plasma bolt that struck with the force of a battering ram.

Thooom!

The impact shook the whole prison. I did it again, and again, and I could see the dwarven wards failing under the repeated impacts of my plasma hammer. At maximum temperature even this magical stone softened under the beam’s heat, and then the impact of the next high density cycle blew the softened material away.

A dozen more colossal hammer blows, and the ward broke. After that the stone crumbled quickly, and in less than a minute I broke through into a larger space. I played the beam in an expanding spiral, widening the hole until we could easily fit.

The moment I shut down the beam Mara dove through the hole. She shifted in midair, becoming a two-headed fox the size of an elephant with tongues of fire running through her fur.

I followed her down, and found myself in an open space the size of a sports stadium. But even that vast space felt crowded, barely able to contain the mountain of fur that filled it. What was that line from the Edda? Something about his maw reaching from the ground to the sky, and “‘twould gape wider yet were there room!”

I could almost believe it. This monster was bigger than the ones I’d unleashed from the Sunspire, and the weight of divine power that flowed through him dwarfed anything I’d seen to date. Yet here he lay, bound by a flimsy-looking ribbon of translucent lace and magic that wound around his limbs and sealed his jaws shut.

Not that the gods had stopped there. Apparently once they had him bound they’d decided to take no chances, because he was festooned in steel chains with links so huge I’d have had trouble getting my arms around one. The floor of the prison was a bowl made of orichalcum, set with hundreds of giant rings that anchored the chains. Even his tail was pinned down by webs of steel chain.

Mara barely seemed to notice. She bounded down and across the room towards the wolf’s head, calling out in excitement.

“Brother, the day of your freedom is at hand! I am Mara, daughter of Loki and Gaea, and freedom is my domain. Muster your strength, and together we shall break these bonds that bind you.”

The great wolf shifted in his chains, and sniffed at Mara as she approached.

“Check our kinship as carefully as you like, big brother,” Mara said with a laugh. “I could feel you even with the walls of this prison in the way, but I’ll wait until you’re sure of me. Just don’t take too long, because our enemies won’t be distracted forever.”

Fenrir growled, or spoke, I honestly couldn’t tell which with the way his jaws were chained together. But Mara seemed to understand him.

“Our allies blew up the Sunspire,” she answered. “Can you believe it? Odin had hidden it in Asgard for some plan of his, but that’s one scheme that backfired on him. Now he’s got a bunch of angry gods and divine beasts rampaging through the streets, all pissed off about being left to rot for thousands of years. Poetic, huh?”

I was distracted from Fenrir’s reply by a flash of white from above. A swan landed beside Mara, and shifted into Aphrodite’s naked form.

“I hope you’re almost done, Mara, because we’ve got trouble coming!” She said breathlessly. “The prison guards have found the hole you made, and they’ve opened a portal atop the prison. There’s a band of einherjar marching through, and I heard someone say they’re Tyr’s personal guard.”

Fenrir growled at the name.

Aphrodite looked up, and up, and up at him, her eyes gleaming with excitement. “Yes, I know. Maybe you’ll get a chance to end the treacherous bastard this time? But you’d better work fast, Mara. I don’t know how long we have.”

Mara shifted back to human form and put her hands on her hips, and surveying the chains.

“Right. Don’t worry, brother, we’ll have you unbound long before he can get here. Sunstrike, start cutting those steel chains free from the floor. I’m going to tackle Gleipnir.”

Chapter 25

I started with one of the tie-down rings that anchored the chains on Fenrir’s hindquarters. It was an unexpected challenge, but one my golem proved well suited to meet. At maximum temperature my plasma beam easily melted through the ring of enchanted steel, leaving a glowing puddle of liquid metal on the floor.

I had some worries about how much the heat would spread, but thankfully they’d used chains instead of cables. The end of the chain glowed orange with heat where I’d cut it away, but the next link was barely red and the glow didn’t seem to be spreading beyond that. The Fenris wolf wasn’t exactly delicate to start with, so I doubted my work was going to do him any harm. I moved on to the next tie-down, and started cutting it away.

Meanwhile, Mara stepped up to the ribbon wrapped around Fenrir’s muzzle, and took a close look.

“Yeah, it’s a conceptual binding, just like I thought. Let’s do this. Release!”

A shudder went through the ribbon, rattling the chains wrapped over it and sending a tremor into the floor. But it didn’t break. Instead, the reaction somehow led to one of the wards that shielded the chamber against divination evaporating.

“What the fuck?” Mara exclaimed.

“Having performance problems, dear?” Aphrodite teased. “Maybe you should leave this kind of thing to the men.”

Mara gave her the finger. “Fuck off, bitch. I can do this. I just have to figure out the trick. They’ve got this thing tied into the wards somehow, so trying to break it opens other shit instead.”

I cut through another ring, and moved on to the next. Fenrir growled something, but I still couldn’t make heads or tails of his speech.

“I know, brother,” Mara said. “But I don’t know what else this thing is tied to. If I just hit it again it will probably break the reinforcement spells on the ceiling and make it fall on us, or something stupid like that. I guess I could just keep hitting it until everything breaks, but then I might be too worn out to crack Gleipnir.”

My talents weren’t well suited to this esoteric bullshit, so I just kept cutting rings while Mara pondered. I was almost done with his hindquarters now, but I could hear activity somewhere above us.

“We’re about to have company,” Aphrodite said.

Mara growled in frustration. “I know, I know. Could you go distract them for me? I only need a minute.”

“What, and open myself up to a serious punishment if we get caught? You do realize I could still tell all, and be found blameless? I can hardly refuse an order from the one who wears my command ring.”

Mara clenched her fists, and turned to her with a scowl. “Yeah, and do you see me wearing it? Look, Aphrodite, it’s time to put up or shut up. Are you going to keep playing games with everyone, or are you going to stand up and strike a blow against Asgard?”

A squad of armored warriors fell out of the hole in the roof, and hit the floor in a tight formation. Like Brand’s elite guards back in Kozalin they took a fall of hundreds of feet in stride. But this group was protected by a thicket of magical wards, and I could see at a glance that any mage who tried to stop them was in for an uphill battle.

But in the moment that they were getting their bearings Aphrodite casually doffed her top, and arched her back to show off the most magnificent breasts in the universe. They were big, round mountains of perfectly shaped feminine majesty, capped with prominent brown nipples. They bounced as she uncovered them, nipples hardening as they were exposed to view-

Alanna slapped me. “Focus on the task at hand, Daniel,” she chided.

I jerked back to awareness, realizing I’d been caught in some kind of enthrallment even though I wasn’t even physically present.

“Um, yeah. Thanks,” I said.

Tyr’s men stood even less of a chance that I did. They were completely enthralled, staring at Aphrodite’s exposed breasts while their weapons slipped from nerveless fingers. Mara blushed furiously, barely managing to tear her gaze away.

“Fuck, you make a girl feel inadequate,” she grumbled.

“Sure you don’t want to put on my ring? You could order me to please you any way you like…”

“I don’t do that shit. I don’t care if you get off on it. It’s still a binding, and I’m… that’s it!”

By then I was halfway around the circle, burning through the tie-down rings for the chains that secured Fenrir’s forelimbs. But I wasn’t going to have time to finish. Another wave of troops fell from the hole in the roof, and this time there were elves and golems among them.

“Sunstrike, take them out!” Mara ordered. “I just need a minute to focus.”

I abandoned the chains, and flew towards the drop zone. Aphrodite enthralled most of the second wave, but some of them resisted. A couple of elves started casting spells, and a giant steel golem with hammers instead of hands lurched towards her. Fortunately I was a lot faster than it was.

I arrived just as the golem was raising its hammer to smash Aphrodite flat, and deployed my force shield. The golem’s hammer bounced off the barrier, barely drawing enough power to register. Then I fired the plasma canon.

Thousands of pounds of enchanted steel eroded away in a matter of seconds, like ice under a spray of boiling water. A glowing fog of steel vapor washed over the men behind it, and most of them died before they even had time to scream. They were the lucky ones. The ones with the best wards were just thrown across the room to smash into the unyielding wall of orichalcum with bone-breaking force, their armor glowing with heat as it burned off their flesh.

“Such a gallant knight,” Aphrodite purred, completely indifferent to the carnage. “I’ll save a kiss to thank you when we’ve made good our escape.”

But there were more enemies dropping into the room. Enchanted arrows burrowed into my shield, erupting in pyrotechnic displays of magic, and a bolt of lightning arced down from the roof to envelop my golem. It didn’t do any damage to the sturdy construct, but at this rate it wouldn’t take long for them to figure out which of their weapons could penetrate my barrier.

“Fall back and protect Mara,” I said. “I’ll keep them distracted for as long as I can.”

I swept the beam of my plasma cannon through the enemy troops, and then lilted it upwards to hose down the hole they were coming through. I was positioned so they had to get past me to get at Mara, but the room was so big there was plenty of room to maneuver. If they were smart it wouldn’t be hard for a group to split up, and circle around me to get a shot at her.

“I’ll do what I can,” Aphrodite agreed. Her body dissolved into a wave of water that rushed back across the room, and swelled into a dome that hid Mara from sight.

Was all of her magic so odd? Well, as long as it got the job done.

A flurry of frost magic rained down on me, having no effect on my golem. The giant mass of ice that formed around me was kind of interesting, but I wasn’t an elemental. I just fired the plasma cannon again, and the whole thing exploded into a cloud of steam and flying ice fragments. The dispel arrows were more of a threat, but it would take a lot of those in quick succession to accomplish anything.

I was too far away from Mara to hear her directly, but the same enchantment I’d come up with for my cameras could carry voices. I activated my link to the earring I’d made her, so we could communicate at a distance. But she was just muttering to herself.

“...I am the fire dancing free in wind…”

A dispelling blew my force shield down, and an implosion of black magic sucked me in before I could even think of a response. If I’d been there in person I would have been crushed into a paste, but my golem shrugged it off easily.

“...the bright spark that burns forever in the night…”

An armored man appeared out of nowhere behind me, and brought an enchanted hammer down on my golem with such force that it actually dented the steel. Maybe he thought I couldn’t shoot him without hitting Mara, but I didn’t need to hit him directly. I rotated the golem to point the plasma cannon straight down, and fired a brief shot. The backblast sent me rocketing into the air, and I caught a glimpse of the fireball washing over him before he vanished again.

“...the secrets hidden in the depths of the void…

For just a moment, no one was attacking me. No more troops were jumping down the hole, and the ones already in the room were dead, dying or at least playing dead. I sent another jet of plasma up to wash over the breach, hoping they’d back off and rethink their assault.

“...and the furtive revelations of silence…”

But my hopes were in vain. Instead, a new portal opened right in the room. I turned my plasma cannon on it without even waiting to see what came out, but this time the beam was reflected back at me. I dodged aside, and shut it down before I melted myself.

Striding through the portal was a giant of a man, eight feet tall if he was an inch, clad in heavy plate made of a dark metal my sorcery didn’t recognize. In his left hand he held a black sword that dripped with liquid green fire, while a round shield with a mirrored surface was strapped to his right arm. His right hand was missing.

That, and the aura of divine power that surrounded him, told me who I was looking at. Tyr, the Norse god of justice and war. The god who sacrificed his right hand to trick Fenrir into letting himself be bound.

“...beloved brother, blood of my blood…”

He didn’t waste time on words, instead rushing across the hall towards the dome of water that hid Mara. I hurriedly dropped into position to block him, and extended my force shield again. But I wasn’t sure it would actually stop him.

My golem didn’t have any secondary weapons, but maybe I didn’t need one. I fired off a burst from the plasma cannon again, this time aiming at the floor in front of Tyr instead of directly at him.

“...drink deep of my nature, my gift for you…”

I was hoping the wash of superheated plasma that spread across the floor would slow him down. But instead he jumped over it, diving forward to thrust his sword into my golem. I dodged aside at the last moment, and the blade cut a deep gouge in the construct’s armor.

I felt Alanna flinch as the edge pricked the golem’s wooden core. Whatever deadly enchantment that sword carried, it could hurt her if it connected. I had no idea how much of a threat that was, and had no time to ask. But the fact that two inches of enchanted steel didn’t even slow it down wasn’t encouraging.

“...for no chains can bind the dancing flame…”

Tyr flicked his sword at Aphrodite’s barrier, and a whip of green fire lashed out to strike the water. It collapsed instantly, washing away into a shallow puddle, and Aphrodite reappeared behind Mara. She screamed in pain, curling up on herself while patches of green fire ate into her skin.

“...no barrier can contain a riddle’s unknown answer…”

My golem’s flight enchantment was powerful enough to withstand the recoil of its plasma cannon, which gave it some amazing maneuverability. I zipped towards him like a cannonball, only to stop just out of his sword’s reach to fire a burst of plasma at him.

It was a good thing I hadn’t carried through with my initial impulse to ram him, because his sword was in the way. It split the plasma beam somehow, the energy washing by to either side of him without touching a hair on his head. I was already rising up, firing again to burn away a lash of green fire that he sent my way. But I’d distracted him just long enough.

“...and today, we gift you our freedom!”

The steel chains that still wrapped Fenrir’s body exploded off of him. A hail of broken steel filled the air, and Tyr was forced to stop and raise his shield to deflect the lethal shower. A heavy length of chain struck my golem, putting another dent in its armor.

As for Gleipnir, the mystic bond that the gods had originally used to trap Fenrir? It just evaporated, misting away into nothingness like a fading dream.

The Fenris wolf stood up, and shook himself like a wet dog. A shower of broken magic cascaded off of him, ancient curses and bindings from a dozen different sources. Tyr cursed, and backed away.

Fenrir’s voice was a bass rumble so deep it was more felt than heard, like an earthquake given speech. “Finally!” He growled. “A thousand years lost to the treachery of the Aesir, but now at last I walk free again. The hour of your doom is at hand, deceiver!”

He lunged at Tyr, the great jaws that could snap up a dinosaur gaping wide. The god dodged aside with an impressive burst of speed, and flicked a whip of green fire at Fenrir. But the fell magic that had brought Aphrodite to her knees with a single hit barely singed the great wolf’s fur.

Tyr fled, running for the portal he’d arrived through in the moment it took the great wolf to recover from his lunge. I opened up with my plasma cannon again, firing a long burst through the portal in hopes of wrecking whatever mechanism was maintaining it. But it must have been too sturdy for that, because it held together long enough for the god to dive right through the beam and vanish.

The portal closed a moment later. I cut the plasma beam, and Fenrir glared at the spot where his enemy had escaped.

“Troublesome worm, your tricks will not save you. I shall follow your trail through every trap and hiding hole in this cursed city, until no stone is left standing on another! Run and hide, little cowards. Fenrir walks free, and nothing will save you from my jaws!”

His booming voice was so loud I was sure the whole city could hear it. For a moment I was worried that he was going to go berserk, and we’d have to watch him run off on some crazy attempt to take on all of Asgard single-handed. But then he chuckled, his voice dropping to a more reasonable volume as he started to shrink.

Mara had collapsed at some point, but she managed to find her feet again as the Fenris wolf shrunk from a city-trampling monster to a mere elephant-sized wolf. She wiped the sweat from her brow, and looked up at him with a triumphant grin.

“That will send them running,” she said. “Our armies are gathering on the Golden Field, brother. Will you join us there?”

“Reckless girl,” Fenrir growled. “What would you do if I didn’t return your aspects?”

She shrugged. “When I just freed you from eternal bondage? I don’t want to live in a world where my own brother would do that to me. Besides, I know you better than that. Jormungandr and Hel have told me a lot about you. ”

“Have they, now? Did they explain why father left me here for so long, after promising he’d have me free the moment they relaxed their guard?”

“You don’t know?” Mara said, astonished. “They bound him too, Fenrir. They murdered Narvi and used his guts to make the bindings. They put him in a cold, wet cave in the depths of the Earth, and conjured a serpent avatar to hang from a stalactite above him and drip venom on his face for the rest of eternity. Then they made Sigyn sit next to him and catch the venom in a tiny little bowl, so she’d have to watch him suffer every time it overflows.”

“Those sick fucks,” Fenrir growled, his tail lashing in outrage. “But then, where did you come from?”

“They bound his power and his limbs, but not his dick,” Mara explained with a smirk. “Gaea knows everything that lies beneath the Earth, so she could get to his prison even when no one else could. She wants Asgard destroyed, too, so she made a deal with dad. She raised me in her hidden kingdom, and as soon as I was strong enough I snuck back to dad’s prison and freed him.”

“Sigyn must have loved that. Alright, kid, I’ll play along with father’s schemes for now.”

He stuck out his enormous tongue, and gave her a lick that swept from knees to eyebrows. Mara giggled in delight, and I saw something pass between them. Deep magic washing out of the great wolf to return to its rightful owner, and something more that passed with it.

“I am in your debt, little sister,” Fenrir said. “Woe betide any who would do you hard. Now, introduce your companions to me.”

“Surely I don’t need an introduction,” Aphrodite put in. “Oh, and thanks for all the help with that soulfire, everyone. Not like it’s a big deal, or anything.”

Aphrodite’s clothes were torn and ragged, with big patches missing where Tyr’s flame had burned them away, but the skin beneath was unblemished. Mara looked guilty for a split second until she looked back and saw her companion’s state. Then she rolled her eyes.

“Drama queen. Brother, this is Aphrodite, the last survivor of the Dodecatheon. The Aesir have been keeping her as a thrall since the they sacked Olympus, but she’s escaping with us now. Oh, and my little golem is Sunstrike. He’s smart enough to follow orders if you call him by name.”

“That’s a mighty weapon you’ve crafted, especially at your age,” Fenrir said. “Well met, Aphrodite. Healing is beyond my talents, but I see that you’ve managed. What was the plan for escaping from Asgard?”

“Our distraction is still tearing up the city,” Mara said. “We just need to move fast, and crash the gate before they can get a war party ready for us. They won’t dare follow us too far, not with the force we’ve got assembled out on the Golden Fields.”

“So it’s speed and fury, is it? Then mount up, little ladies, and prepare to do battle. We shall show these fools the error of their ways.”

Mara wasted no time leaping onto Fenrir’s back, and grabbing a handful of fur. Aphrodite wasn’t so athletic, and resorted to becoming a swan again momentarily to reach her perch. She settled into place behind Mara with an eager smile and a saucy wiggle.

“Ah, it’s been so long since I had such a mighty beast between my thighs,” she purred. “But how will you escape this prison of orichalcum, Fenrir? Can you really make the leap to reach that hole in the ceiling?”

“They’ll have an ambush up there by now,” Mara objected. “Sunstrike, why don’t you show my protective brother how badass you are?”

“You got it, Mara. Cover your ears and shield your eyes, because this wall is coming down.”

I deployed my force shield to guard against backblast, and fired up the plasma cannon again. My weapon hammered through the magical stone in a spectacular display of pyrotechnics, and then made short work of the maze beyond.

When it broke through I set the golem moving, with the force shield still deployed. The barrier plowed our path clear of the debris and molten rock that covered the floor, and Fenrir followed close behind. I kept the cannon blazing away until my golem reached daylight, and then swept the beam left and right to cover the plaza in front of the prison.

My attack devastated a band of troops who had been drawn up outside, and then Fenrir came bounding out behind me. He immediately began to grow, doubling in size in the few seconds it took to cross the open space.

“Turn left!” Mara called from his back. “The big street with the fountains running down the middle. It goes straight to the south gate.”

A volley of arrows rained down on them from the troops on top of the prison building, but Aphrodite called up a wind that blew them away. Then Mara expanded her personal force field to protect both women, and I swept the beam of my plasma cannon across their position.

The whole edge of the roof came apart in a rolling explosion of broken, half-melted stone. The archers who’d been caught directly in the beam just vanished, their flesh boiling away in an instant. Men at the periphery of the destruction were sent flying, and a fireball of expanding plasma enveloped most of the roof.

This was definitely one of my more successful weapons to date. Too bad I wouldn’t get to keep it. But the enchantment factories I’d used to make it were safely tucked away in Alanna’s bower, ready to churn out the parts for a new version whenever I needed it.

By the time I made it back to Mara’s side Fenrir had grown again. Now he stood four stories tall, looming over the buildings to either side as he galloped down the avenue. Mara held on to his fur with both hands, laughing gleefully and breathing jets of fire into buildings as they went by. Aphrodite was right behind her, with both arms wrapped tightly around the young demigoddess and her blonde hair streaming behind her like a banner.

“Having fun?” I said.

“Fuck, yes! Run for your lives, little ants. Hide in your cellars, and hope we kill you last!”

Most of the buildings we passed were already in ruins from the detonation of the Sunspire, and the people here were in no mood to tangle with a legendary monster. The women screamed when they saw us coming, and the men mostly ran for cover.

There were exceptions, here and there. Sometimes an einherjar would take a swing at Fenrir as he ran by, or an elf would lob a spell or a flurry of arrows. But they might as well have tried to kill a mountain. Swords and spears bounced off of Fenrir’s fur, while fire and lightning washed over him without so much as singing it. It was a curious magic, unlike anything I’d seen before. Like Fenrir’s true vastness was somehow compressed into this smaller shape, and anything that tried to affect him would have to do damage on the same scale to make any impression.

In the distance I could see that there was still a battle going on near the ruins of the Sunspire. A swarm of winged horses swirled around the flying jellyfish beast, their riders unleashing bolts of fire and lighting at the monster. Thor and Odin were fighting the lightning lizard, and there seemed to be a series of smaller battles going on in the surrounding district. The combatants weren’t visible from here, but every few seconds I’d see a building collapse or a magical attack erupt among the ruins.

Good. Maybe that would keep the Asgardians busy long enough for us to make our escape.

Somewhere in the distance, a horn blew. A single long, piercing note that echoed across the city, cutting through the din of battle. With a start I realized that I was hearing it not just through the golem’s sensors, but with my own ears as well.

“The Gjallarhorn,” Alanna breathed. “Now all the Nine Worlds will know that Fenrir is free, and Ragnarok is at hand.”

“So much for hoping they’d be distracted,” I grumbled.

Alanna laughed. “Do you fear an ambush even now, my wizard? Set your mind at ease, for what you hear is the death knell of Asgard. The blowing of the Gjallarhorn calls in every debt that the Aesir are owed, renounces every obligation, and brings to an end every working of might or magic that might divert their strength from battle in the dark days to come. If he thought there was the slightest chance of stopping Fenrir, Heimdall would not have blown his horn.”

As if to prove her point, Fenrir’s headlong charge brought him around a slight curve in the road and into the midst of what was clearly supposed to be an ambush. Teams of dwarves were laying out giant caltrops and wire traps across the road, while elves wove binding spells into the works and an artillery company set up a battery of massive ballistae. But they were long minutes away from finishing their work, and that was time they’d never have.

Fenrir plowed through the incomplete obstacles without even breaking stride, crushing steel and stone beneath his paws. One of the ballistae got off a shot, launching a heavy bolt of obsidian overflowing with death magic that actually penetrated a foot or so into Fenrir’s flank. But such a tiny injury was inconsequential to him, and the rest of the artillery crews were still straining to load their weapons.

Mara breathed a wash of flame across one side of the plaza, and I covered the other side with a short blast from my plasma cannon. Fenrir trampled the siege engines underfoot, pausing for only a moment to snatch up some hapless demigod who’d been directing the work. The great wolf’s jaws snapped shut, and he gulped down his victim.

“So dies the blood of the betrayer!” Fenrir shouted. Then he threw back his head, and let loose a blood chilling howl. It was a horrible sound, filled with the rage of a dozen centuries of imprisonment, and a hunger vast enough to devour the world.

Not for the first time, I wondered if unleashing this thing had been a wise decision. But it was too late now for regrets. Like it or not, I was committed to this course.

The survivors of the ambush fled into the ruins, and Fenrir resumed his headlong rush across the city. The gates of Asgard came into view, standing undamaged despite the recent devastation. From a distance they looked like solid iron, standing maybe forty feet tall and about that wide in a wall that stretched up hundreds of feet overhead. But solid as they might look, I knew better than to think they’d stop this walking mountain of hate.

“This is where I get off,” I told Mara.

“If you’re sure,” she replied. “You could still come with us, you know.”

“I have another iron in the fire,” I told her. “Don’t worry, I’m sure we’ll meet again soon enough. Good luck, and take care.”

“You too,” she said. “I… I love you, you know. Don’t get yourself killed out there.”

“I’ll be careful,” I assured her. “Here.”

I passed her the control link for the golem. It was an intent control link, tied to the same earring as the communicator I’d given her, and she took up control of the device with the easy confidence of an experienced sorceress. I pulled away as she did, leaving only a tenuous connection that would let me watch what she did with it.

“Got it,” she said. Then, louder, “Brother! Shall I burn a hole in the gate?”

“I’ll not crawl like a worm through some maze of traps and wards,” the great wolf growled. “I’ll take my own path. Hold on tight, and ward yourself.”

Fenrir grew, swelling back to the monstrous size I’d first seen him at. But he didn’t stop there. In the space of half a mile he expanded until he was almost as tall as the wall. Then, as he reached the plaza in front of Asgard’s gates, he gathered himself and made a prodigious leap.

He sailed high into the air, clearing the top of the wall by a dozen yards or more. I caught a brief glimpse of the open fields beyond the city, and the distant shore of the sea far beyond. Even from dozens of miles away, I could see that the whole coastline was dark with the countless multitudes of Hel’s army.

Then they passed through the city wards, and my connection was cut.

Chapter 26

As I prepared to carry out the last step of my escape plan, I reflected that perhaps I should have been more specific with my instructions to Fiona and Caitlyn. When I’d sat down to grow this decoy body I’d been a little annoyed to find that the blood sample they’d given me came from an elf, but that was a minor issue. I’d disguised myself as a dark elf once before, so I didn’t think it would be too big of a problem. A little unsettling, especially since Vanir would probably have differences from their darker kin, but not too bad.

It wasn’t until the decoy was half-grown that I realized it was female.

By then it was too late to get another sample and start over, so I’d decided to make do. After all, how bad could it be?

“You're surprisingly good at this,” Alanna teased, as I slowly walked back and forth across her training room. “Do you take a woman’s form often?”

I took another step, carefully putting one foot directly in front of the other instead of walking the way I normally would. I tried not to think too much about how the movement made my hips sway, or the way the unfamiliar weight on my chest affected my balance. How did elves ever walk in high heels? They were so tiny and slender, it felt like half my body weight was hanging off my chest.

“It’s the force sorcery,” I confided. “It gives me an innate sense of motion. I’d be falling all over myself without it.”

“That doesn’t explain knowing how to walk like a woman,” my familiar pointed out.

“Trust me, I’ve spent plenty of time watching women walk,” I said. “Besides, men getting turned into women is a popular story idea where I’m from, so I’ve seen plenty of talk about all the pitfalls. It’s really not that complicated, as long as you can avoid makeup and fancy hairstyles. The big question is, can I pass as an elf?”

“I don’t know, can you remember to drool over every over-muscled warrior to cross our path?” Alanna said with a giggle.

I grimaced. “Seriously? I thought it was just the young ones who were so oversexed.”

“You look barely thirty, and for a Vanir that is young indeed. An innocent young maiden, eagerly awaiting her first opportunity to be seduced into a life of debauchery.”

“I suppose I could try to copy that ageless look the older ones get,” I mused.

“No, no, this will be fine. In all seriousness, today of all days there is little need to worry over subtle details. You could throw your hands in the air and run through the streets screaming, and the people would merely think you stricken with grief. Try looking sad, and worried.”

I brushed a lock of blonde hair out of my eyes, and frowned. I’m not the greatest actor, but I suppose I could find plenty of things to feel sad about. I still didn’t know when I’d see my girls again, or what was happening in Kozalin in my absence. I’d tried to set them up with good defenses, but there were so many things that could go wrong…

A surprise hug distracted me from my incipient brooding.

“I rescind my suggestion, Daniel,” Alanna said. “The sheer cuteness of this visage is far too devastating. If you frown like that every man we pass is going to stop to offer you his aid. Come, let me braid your hair in a warrior’s fashion, and you can play at being a fierce young spell-slinger running errands for her mother.”

I really didn’t want to think too much about how it felt to have my breasts pressed against hers. Big, soft, extremely sensitive breasts… no, bad thoughts. No distractions right now.

“That sounds like a plan,” I said. “Why do elves braid their hair, anyway? Doesn’t that just give enemies something to grab?”

“It’s a statement of skill. A fearful novice might cut her hair short to prevent it from being used against her, but a skilled warrior need not sacrifice beauty for victory. Besides, grabbing the end of a waist-length braid is an excellent way to get your arm cut off.”

“Um… right, I guess I can see that. If it was shoulder-length having it pinned would limit your mobility, but if there’s a couple of feet of play you’ve got plenty of room to turn around and take a swing at the guy holding it.”

“Yes, and if someone can get close enough to reach the base of your braid they could just as easily stab you. There, that’s done. I do wish I could armor you, though.”

I shook my head. “Too many people have seen me wearing you recently. The Vanir don’t seem to use dryad armor very often, so it would be too conspicuous. Even the bracer is a little risky.”

“Perhaps, but I will be quite upset if you command me to leave you entirely. You will need my aid to return to Midgard, and there are too many ways that an arranged meeting could go awry.”

“I know, Alanna. Believe me, I have no intention of getting separated from you. I’m a little concerned that someone might try to find you with divinations while we’re still here, but our wards against that are pretty decent.”

“Such spells will not reveal me,” she said confidently. “I grew wise to such tricks in the days of Cronus, and my alliances in the unseen realms run deep. No spirit or dream could betray me to some upstart god, and the dead arts of modern wizardry will avail them naught.”

I stopped fussing with my clothes, and really looked at her for a moment. Even now, in the middle of this crazy mess, she carried herself with the calm self-assurance of a consummate professional. As if the threat of angry gods and soul-eating monsters were no big deal, just another day in the trenches.

I put my hands on her shoulders, and met her gaze squarely. “Alanna, you are amazing. I’m lucky to have you, and I want you to know that I realize it.”

“Luck, Daniel? Do you think it was chance that led Hecate to send the grove where I dwelt in obscurity to you? Or that Hecate knew of me, and desired my support for your cause? Or yet, that the strongest familiar in the world would seek a bond with the most interesting wizard of the age? No, the only uncertainty lies in our future. Will our bond be a brief alliance of convenience, to be set aside when our current troubles are past? Or will we stand together through the turning of the ages, and forge a shared legend for ourselves?”

“You can be pretty intimidating sometimes,” I admitted. “I know you’ve got hidden depths that you still haven’t revealed, even now. But that’s okay. The more you show me of yourself, the more convinced I am that we’re good for each other. I’m in this for the long haul. Unless you’ve got a collection of terrible habits you’ve been hiding?”

“Secrets of the past I may hide, but never my true self. I have enjoyed our partnership thus far, and I have high hopes for the future. Now go, and bring this adventure to a finish before my fragile self-control fails entirely. Working such magnificent carnage together has brought my passions to full bloom, and seeing your soul behind such innocent eyes is not helping. If you tarry much longer I shall carry you off to my playroom, and introduce you to all the delights of womanhood.”

I couldn’t suppress my laugh.

“You’re my kind of woman, Alanna,” I said, drawing her into a hug. “You can seduce me later, alright? I’m planning to do some serious enchantment work on my new body as it grows, so I’m going to be stuck this way for at least a week. Let’s see, now. Which one of these paths leads to the right exit?”

Alanna had been happy to show me how to get out of a dryad’s bower, but that was a challenging task under the best of circumstances. Without my mana sorcery it would have taken months of practice to learn how to negotiate the mind-bending inner geometry of a dryad’s tree, and that was with a normal dryad. Alanna’s inner nature was such a maze of shifting connections that I might never be able to navigate it without her help. But she seemed impressed that I could even make the attempt.

A wordless tug pulled me towards one of the shorter passages. I pushed into it, and felt the welcoming warmth of Alanna’s magic surround me. Then I was through, stepping out into open air again.

The Sunspire’s explosion may have looked impressive, but Asgard was a sprawling megalopolis far too big to be destroyed by a single blast. The quiet courtyard I found myself in had escaped with just a little damage to the trees, and a few broken windows. The sounds of marching feet and officers shouting orders reached me from somewhere nearby, but a quick look around showed that the nook where I’d appeared was empty.

Good. I put my hand on the tree that I’d emerged from, and felt Alanna’s presence there.

“We’re clear,” I said.

Good. I’m sorry, little one, but I must go now.

Somehow the ancient dryad had managed to possess a normal tree, and use it as a connection between Asgard and her own inner world. Now she withdrew from it, leaving just a normal tree behind.

“Is there any way for someone to tell that you’ve done that?” I asked.

“I leave few tracks for any hunter to find, my wizard. This tree will be more healthy than most, and if she survives Ragnarok she’ll develop a dryad of her own in time. But there are many ways to explain such a change, especially in a city full of elves.

“I guess so. Alright, you said you know the way?”

I was relying a lot on Alanna for this last errand. I hadn’t wanted to do anything that could give away what I was planning, even to my other companions. Mara had other loyalties, after all, and even the twins weren’t entirely trustworthy. But Alanna was another story.

She’d woven the clothes I now wore just last night, using some exotic blend of skill and magic to produce an outfit that perfectly fit my adopted persona. The odd concoction of silk and leather fit me like a glove, and made me look like some sort of swashbuckling pirate princess. I could have done without the giant boob window, and the short skirt left a lot of bare thigh on display. But the cloak was enchanted to swirl around me as I moved, incidentally hiding my figure from behind, and the staff I carried would probably warn off any rowdy einherjar I came across.

It was also a pretty decent magical focus. Not that I was going to get into any fights in this state. I didn’t dare put enchantments on any of my equipment, for fear someone would recognize my distinctive style of magic. When I was growing this body I’d enchanted one of the vertebrae in my neck with a power tap, and a basic set of healing and flight spells. Aside from that I was banking entirely on subterfuge from this point on, because with Asgard already on high alert getting into a fight was just asking to get smacked down by some angry god.

Valhalla was far enough from the Sunspire that its halls had escaped with minimal damage. The streets were crowded with troops of soldiers marching here and there, moving to bolster the city’s defenses and contain the monsters I’d freed from the soul prison. I caught a few men checking me out as I made my way through the streets, but no one paid me any serious attention.

From there Alanna’s directions took me into the periphery of the devastated zone. There the blast had shattered windows, stripped the roofs off of houses and sent clouds of debris flying through the air. Here and there a building had collapsed entirely, and quite a few trees were down.

All in all, though, Asgard had weathered the blast a lot better than a modern city would. Most of the buildings were made of stone, with outer walls a foot thick, and the blocks they’d been built with melded into a single solid mass using earth magic. The rest were grown from a single mass of living wood, instead of being built with boards held together by nails, and again the Vanir liked their walls thick enough to take a beating.

Even so, they’d taken a heavy blow. There were impromptu medical stations set up everywhere, staffed by worried-looking Vanir women and filled with injured people. Work crews struggled to clear the streets of fallen trees, and now and then a party of armored warriors rushed past.

I found my way blocked by a tree that had fallen into a fountain, smashing it and sending jets of water spraying across the street. A group of burly, bare-chested men armed with heavy axes were working on the obstruction, cutting the tree into sections and hauling them out of the way.

It was strange to be so tiny. I barely topped five feet in this body, and those guys were all well over six. Not to mention being built like linebackers. Shit, their arms were as big around as my waist. Any of them could just pin me down with one hand, and… and…

I shook my head, and pushed my way through the crowd that was threading its way around the mess. Ugh. No. I was not going to think about that.

Too late, my wizard, Alanna said, sounding amused. I did warn you that your stolen form would influence your thoughts.

“I was hoping it would take more than an hour,” I grumbled. “Fuck. Did I get something wrong with this body, or is that normal for elves?”

Did you think Aphrodite was lying when she spoke of the passions of Vanir women? Their blood runs hotter than a minx in season, and the physical prowess of the einherjar strikes to the heart of their greatest weakness. Your human instincts will hold your body’s urges at bay for some time, but I’d advise you not to dally.

“You can say that again.”

A thunderclap sounded in the distance, followed by the distinctive bellow of the lightning lizard. But I didn’t see the jellyfish thing in the sky anymore, and I had no idea how the rest of that fight was going. There was no telling how much longer the distraction would last.

I picked up my pace, hurrying through a residential district and across a park. The strange distance-warping nature of the city came into play, whole blocks passing beneath my feet in a step, and soon I found myself at the foot of a stairway wide enough for the Fenris wolf. At the top was a broad avenue paved with polished marble, lined on both sides with grand palaces.

Turn right at the statue of the winged warrior, and go down that alley between the palaces, Alanna directed.

“Where are we?” I asked. The streets here were nearly deserted, with just a few Vanir hurrying about.

This district holds the homes of the gods, she said. Odin’s hall lies at the end of the avenue, but we need not approach it any closer. This path will take us to a servant’s road that threads between the halls of the Aesir warriors and the towers of the Vanir gods. Our quarry lies at its end.

Nothing makes you sweat like being surrounded by enemies who could squash you like a bug. I walked quickly, and carefully didn’t stare at the fancy buildings as I passed. Stone walls enclosed the grounds of each palace, which helped with that, but even the servant’s entrances on this back street were fantastically ornate. Some were tasteful, and others gaudy as hell, but all of them grabbed at my attention.

Good thing I’ve got a healthy resistance to advertising. I kept my eyes on the path, avoiding eye contact with the other pedestrians without obviously looking away from them. After what felt like a million years, but probably wasn’t more than ten minutes, I finally reached the far end of the road.

There was a high wall in front of me, covered with wards against sneaky intruders like me. A narrow path led left and right along the base of the wall, and far off to the right I could see a heavily guarded gate. There was a whole band of einherjar formed up for battle, and two warriors who stood head and shoulders above the others.

I turned left.

Those two were definitely Thor’s sons, Alanna said. That’s promising.

“If you say so. Where’s this back door you mentioned?”

A little further down. There’s a spot where the path joins another, and there’s a little open space planted with trees for shade. There used to be a bench standing under a large oak tree, and a little pond full of decorative fish.

“I see it,” I said.

The wall the path followed had a curve to it, that didn’t fit into the mostly square grid of Asgard’s streets. The little park area Alanna described filled what would otherwise have been wasted space, between the path and the edge of some god’s grand estate. It was also well out of sight from those gates, and the guards on duty there.

Just put your hand on the oak tree, Alanna said. I’ll take care of the rest.

It looked like a perfectly normal tree. But the moment my bare skin touched its bark, I felt the familiar sensation of being drawn into a dryad’s bower. In the blink of an eye I was pulled through a mind-bending geometry of extradimensional spaces, and deposited in a cozy bedroom with walls of living wood. Alanna was standing beside me, with her arm around mine where I’d been wearing her bracer.

A blonde dryad looked up from the bed, and her eyes went wide. “Alanna!”

My familiar stepped away from me, and opened her arms just in time to intercept an airborne tackle hug.

“Oh gosh you’re back it’s been so long I missed you Melania will be so excited are you here to save us is this your new wizard Tifa come quick it’s Alanna!”

A second dryad stepped out of the wall, looking around wildly, and glomped onto Alanna just as enthusiastically as the first. She returned their hugs with a tolerant smile, and waited patiently for them to run down enough to let her get a word in edgewise.

“Yes, yes, I’m back for a visit. I fear I can’t stay long this time, and I have urgent need to speak with the grove’s mistress. May we use the hidden door?”

The dryads finally released her, and I got my first good look at them. They were twins, both blonde and blue-eyed, with pointed ears like an elf. They looked older than a typical dryad too, more like ageless elves than teenage beauties.

“Introduce us first,” one of them said.

“Yeah, if your new wizard is a Vanir we want to meet her,” the other agreed.

“To speak my companion’s name on the wind would be to betray her,” Alanna said. “I risk the wrath of the gods of blood and iron to secure your escape from the doom your mistress fears, and I can say no more of that for now. But know that I do indeed have a new wizard, a man so canny even death cannot thwart him for long, and my companion speaks with his voice. We would speak with your mistress, to see what may be done on your behalf.”

The dryads obviously had conflicting feelings about that, but after a moment of consideration they nodded in unison.

“If you can give no name, we shall call you Navnlos,” one of them said.

“We are Tira and Tifa, the twin guardians of Idun’s secret door,” the other went on. “We can grant you passage, if Alanna vouches for you. But you must vow never to reveal the secret of how you entered the grove.”

“I so swear,” I agreed.

“Then be welcome, but do your business quickly and don’t linger. As soon as the fighting out there dies down there’s going to be a swarm of young gods going around checking on everything important in the city, and we’re at the top of the list.”

“We shall speak quickly,” Alanna agreed. “Can you send word to Idun of our coming?”

“Already taken care of,” Tifa said. “Iri was visiting me when you showed up. Come on.”

She took us both in hand, and drew us into the wall she’d stepped out of. That put us in another bedroom much like the one we’d just come from. Then she let us go, and Alanna pulled me through another wall.

We were standing in the shade of an entirely different oak tree, some distance inside Idun’s garden. A field full of flowers surrounded us, bordered on three sides by a winding length of hedge too tall to see over. On the fourth side I could make out more fields full of flowers, a different assortment in each field, with more hedges to mark the boundaries. Here and there a tree rose above the hedges, and in the distance I could make out the tops of a large grove. Beyond that, the upper branches of a much larger tree were visible.

“This way,” Alanna said, pulling me along a path that led away from the oak.

That was pretty slick. I guess the fact that they were twins let the dryads link their bowers together, so people could step directly from one to the other even though they were on opposite sides of a heavily warded barrier. It made sense that Idun would have some secret way to get people in and out of her grove, since she’d had more than a thousand years to work something out. But I’d been expecting a sentry on the take, not a magical bypass.

Come to think of it, how the heck can dryads be twins? Aren’t they supposed to be born from their trees, somehow? One more thing to ask Alanna about later.

As we walked, I saw that the fields were clearly part of a garden laid out by someone with sophisticated plant magic. Each field grew several different plants, all of which seemed to be in perpetual full bloom, along with just enough grass to cover the soil and prevent erosion. Gravel paths wound through each field, passing under trees and circling the shores of small ponds that seemed to be connected by a maze of shallow brooks. Wherever the path crossed a stream there would be a few large rocks perfectly situated to act as stepping stones, and other stones were positioned in shady nooks and other spots where a visitor might want to sit.

It had to be artificial, but everything was carefully arranged to look like it had just happened by chance. The overall effect was oddly charming, like the landscape itself wanted to welcome visitors. Then again, for all I knew that was literally true. There was enough magic here that it wouldn’t surprise me if the fields and streams were all home to a family of dryad-like nature spirits.

“I guess you’ve spent a lot of time here,” I ventured.

“I visit from time to time, when my heart grows weary of the world. It is a very hospitable place for my kind, and many of us have gathered here. Idun always gives us a warm welcome, although it can be a bit awkward for me.”

“Oh? Why is that?” I asked.

“Old arguments,” another voice broke in.

I looked up to find a woman of indeterminate nature waiting for us where the path passed through a gap in a hedge. She was definitely some sort of nature spirit, but she seemed far too mature to be a dryad, or even a hamadryad. She was tall and astonishingly muscular for a woman, with a hard face and no curves to speak of. Her only concession to femininity was a long mane of coal-black hair, bound in a braid that nearly reached her knees. She wore a tunic and short dress made from soft leather, with bare feet, and held a long spear tipped with a stone point in one hand.

But the feature that immediately jumped out at me was the fact that her skin had the coppery hue of an American Indian.

Alanna stopped, and drew a calming breath. “Sister,” she said evenly.

“I see you’ve changed your face again,” the stranger said. “Still doing tricks for the humans?”

“I find joy in embracing my nature, instead of denying it as you insist on doing,” Alanna replied. “As you well know. But I did not come here to revisit old arguments, Melania.”

“No, you’re here to lure young Idun into some new foolishness. What is it this time? Shall she spread her legs for some arrogant god to beg his protection? Perhaps sacrifice the golden apples to the depredations of commerce, or enthrall her dryads to a band of wizards? You know how she gets when she thinks she’s out of options, Alanna. I won’t let you take advantage of her.”

Alanna shook her head wearily. “So you still can’t bring yourself to trust her? How sad. I had hoped love would win out in the end.”

Melania flushed. “It’s not about trust!”

Alanna started to reply, but stilled when I put a hand on her arm.

“We’re not here to rehash arguments that were probably ancient when the pyramids were built,” I said. “Melania, I’m sure you know that Idun has been putting out feelers to various parties. I have a message for her from one of them.”

“Didn’t your mother teach you not to interrupt your elders, child?” Melania huffed.

“Hasn’t experience taught you to look beneath the surface, Melania?” I replied.

She stared at me for a long moment. Finally she huffed, and turned away. “You schemers and your tricks. Fine, you can deliver your message. But don’t expect me to stand back and do nothing if Alanna starts weaving one of her webs of honeyed words. Idun is far too trusting, but I know better.”

“Peace, sister. I am only here as a guide for my companion. I shall not snub the lady gardener by ignoring her, but neither shall I make any effort at persuasion.”

“You’d better not, because I’ll be watching.”

She stalked off down the path, and we followed.

Since when are you a sneaky trickster type? I silently asked my familiar.

If I were, I would have long since set her ire to rest, Alanna replied. But she has always preferred to solve her problems by stabbing them, and life has not been kind to her. Now she sees a plot behind every kind word, and the only people she trusts are those she has known from childhood.

So to her, Idun is a cute little kid that she’s looking out for?

Alanna’s lips quirked. Something like that. The last time we fought I accused her of raising a lover for herself.

Now I was fighting not to smirk. Or maybe giggle. This body was definitely prone to giggles.

It was a short walk to the edge of the grove I’d seen before, which was surrounded by a tall hedge of thorn bushes. As we passed through a gap in the hedge I saw that the trees were all of the same species, and filled with so much magic that I would have known something was odd about them even without the other clues. But the scattering of golden apples hanging from their branches made their real nature obvious.

Idun was waiting for us just inside the gate. She looked just like she had the last time I saw her, at the ritual where my girls and I formed our coven bonds. But having met other Aesir since, I saw her in a new light. What I’d taken for an average height was very short for an Aesir, and while she was blonde and buxom she lacked the supernatural beauty I was coming to expect of goddesses. There was no aura of commanding power around her, and the long-handled hoe that she held seemed an absurd affectation compared to the deadly artifacts her kin favored.

But she was no clueless hippy or delusional pacifist. Her smile might be gentle, but her eyes were sharp.

Nor was she alone. Half a dozen elder dryads stood at her back, all of them alert and armed to the teeth. To the naked eye they looked much like Corinna’s band, only with lighter skin and golden-blonde hair. But each of them had the level of power I’d come to expect from demigods like Brand, and everything they wore or carried was enchanted.

“I don’t often receive unfamiliar visitors,” Idun said. “But Alanna’s presence is endorsement enough for me. Be welcome in my grove, stranger.”

“Thank you,” I said. “But we’ve actually met once before. I just wasn’t wearing this face at the time.”

“That’s a rare trick. What word do you bring me, skinshifter? Has Coyote found his balls, perhaps?”

“I wouldn’t know. Not long ago Hestia introduced you to a young coven with some very unusual members. You had some requests for us, and I’m here to take the first step towards fulfilling them. I assume you’d want your own people to take a look at any potential refuge before you rely on it?”

She blinked rapidly, and her grip tightened on her hoe.

“You mean… but… I’m not ready yet!” She protested.

“I didn’t think you would be,” I told her. “Neither are we, but we’re getting there fast. We have a place where dryads can live, that’s protected against both monsters and the Fimbulwinter. We aren’t quite ready to fight off an angry god or Great Beast yet, but we’re getting close.”

Idun glanced uneasily at the sky. “That sounds promising, but what about transportation? My girls aren’t especially mobile.”

“Alanna?” I said.

“My powers have greatly increased of late,” Alanna said. “If they can pick up their trees I can shelter a whole grove of the little ones in my heart, for more than long enough to make the journey. Or I could carry a few of the elder circle.”

“Alanna, you know the weight of destiny our trees bear,” one of the dryads interrupted. “None of us can manage that for more than a few minutes.”

“I can lend you the power,” Alanna said serenely.

The dryad’s eyes went wide. “You have grown mighty indeed, honored elder.”

“Of course,” Alanna replied, as a smug grin stole across her face. “I can’t let my cute little juniors down. Don’t you remember how I promised to protect you, when you were all just saplings?”

“What about-” Idun began.

“I’m not leaving you,” Melania interrupted. “We live or die together, and that’s final.”

Idun looked ready to argue, but something interrupted. Her head suddenly whipped around to stare off into the distance.

“I wish we had more time to discuss this, but events have just overtaken us. Jari, son of Heimdall, is at the gate preparing to inspect the grove for sabotage, and he has Thor’s son Magni with him,” she said. “Runa, Bodil, you’re up. Go with Alanna, and have a look at this hidden fortress of hers. If you can grow and bear fruit there, your survival could change the fate of the world.”

Two of the dryads nodded, and ran for their trees.

“What about you?” Melania protested.

“Do you think the gods will let me go?” Idun scoffed. “No trick will avail us if they set Heimdall on our trail, and if I fly the coop they will never give up looking.”

Two of the towering apple trees vanished. Runa fell to her knees for a moment, before struggling back to her feet and staggering back towards us. Bodil managed to move faster, but I could see the strain on her face.

“She’s right,” I said. “I can’t fight a god, and with motivation like that one of them would track us down eventually.”

Alanna embraced Bodil, and the dryad vanished into her bower. She ran a few steps to where Runa was staggering towards her, and repeated the process.

“But you think they’ll just let the apples of immortality go?” Melania retorted.

“A missing tree or two is merely a backup plan to Odin,” Idun said. “If he wins this war he can always track them down, and kill anyone who has sampled their fruit. And if my fears are well founded, and all of us die in this wretched city, then what does he care about the future?”

Alanna returned, and draped herself against my side.

“The watching god can move quickly when he has need,” she said. “We have no more time to talk. Farewell, everyone. Fight well, and never give up hope!”

Her figure blurred, flowing into the form of a wooden bracer on my arm.

“She’s right,” I said. “There are more forces working in your favor than you know, Idun. When all seems lost, look for rescue where you least expect it.”

I took flight, rising quickly to skim the treetops as I headed away from the gate. Fortunately the giant tree that stood behind Idun’s estate gave me an obvious landmark to orient on. I zoomed away towards the towering branches, wishing I’d taken the time to build a more powerful flight spell.

But it was good enough. In moments I was among the branches of Yggdrasil, the mystical tree that connected all of the nine worlds. The garden behind me faded from view, as Alanna’s confident directions guided me away from the Golden City.

Chapter 27

The sun beat down on the desiccated badlands of Alanna’s hidden refuge, raising heat waves that made distant mesas seem to dance. Her tree was the only visible sign of life, and not much of one. Ancient wounds scarred the gnarled trunk, the marks of countless blades almost lost beneath the scars of fires and lightning strikes. What remained seemed more dead than alive, petrified into some odd amalgam of wood and stone. But here and there a clump of fresh twigs sprang from an ancient branch, spreading fresh new leaves to catch the sun.

I didn’t miss the symbolism. This tree was planted in some remote corner of the dreamlands, and I had no doubt its form was shaped as much by her feelings as anything concrete. I couldn’t imagine what she must have survived, in the course of a life that spanned all of human history and more besides. It wasn’t surprising that tragedy had left its mark on her. But I resolved that one day, I was going to see this tree with more greenery than scars.

It might take a thousand years. But so what? I wasn’t going anywhere.

“Will this do?” Alanna asked, sounding uncharacteristically hesitant.

“Is it really as big as it looks?” I asked.

It was still strange to hear a woman’s voice when I spoke. But I was resolved to take my time for once, and do things right. I could deal with being an elf girl for a week if it meant finally leaving the fragility of normal human bodies behind.

“The boundaries of a dream are always uncertain,” Alanna said. “If you go more than a few miles from my tree the landscape will start to change when you aren’t looking at it. If you keep going you’ll eventually find yourself in another dream.”

“A few miles is plenty of room,” I assured her. “I can test high-speed flight when we get back to Kozalin. Right now I just need enough space to rough out some ideas, and maybe test fire a weapon or two. It won’t do you any harm if I use something like the plasma cannon on one of those mesas in the distance, will it?”

“Of course not. They aren’t a part of me, and I draw no great strength from this place. It is simply a retreat, where I can be alone when I find myself in a melancholy mood. I dare say a few craters would be an improvement. Just be careful that you don’t catch my tree in one of your explosions.”

I turned to Alanna, and took her hands in mine. “I’d sooner kill myself than hurt you, Alanna. Seriously, you’ve been a life saver through this whole ordeal. I can’t count the number of times you’ve gone above and beyond anything I would have expected. Is there anything I can do for you, to say thank you?”

She smiled gently, and pulled me into an embrace. She was taller than my temporary form, and my head nestled comfortably against her breasts.

“Simply treat me with kindness, Daniel. You’ve already won me, and I have no need to be conquered. Although I’m looking forward to you regaining your manhood.”

I found myself blushing. “Hey, you were the one who insisting on showing me what being a lesbian is like.”

“It would be a tragedy to pass up such an opportunity. But I miss the strong embrace of my wizard. I would spend a thousand years in your arms if I could.”

I hugged her. “You really don’t like being alone, do you?”

“I’m afraid I can be quite clingy for the first decade of a new relationship, Daniel. I would love to be your armor all the time, holding you close and protecting you with my body at the same time. I… might also have some strange fantasies that involve replacing all your furniture with my own branches, so I can always be near you.”

I laughed. “That’s creepy, but kind of endearing. You should talk to Avilla about it when we get back. I don’t mind indulging your fantasies a bit, as long as it doesn’t leave my coven-mates feeling like they’re being spied on or pushed aside. I’m sure she can come up with something that strikes a reasonable balance.”

“You’re spoiling me, Daniel. Now I’m even more eager for you to resume your true form.”

“Me too. Let’s see how things are coming along, shall we?”

Ever since Hecate summoned me to this world I’d been in a frantic race for time, and there were a lot of things that had been pushed aside just because I never had time to address them. One of those was the personal enhancement effects that my flesh magic was capable of. In theory I could have used them months ago, but laying enchantments on living flesh is a lot slower than making magic items. I had to let the magic soak in gradually, building up layer by layer until it finally grew into something worthwhile.

Before now I’d always assumed that building another enchantment factory or learning a new trick would always be a better use of my time. But not anymore. Seeing the powers of Asgard, fighting the Lightbringers and witnessing Fenrir’s unchaining, had finally convinced me that this was a world where soldiers can only do so much. If I wanted to survive getting involved in the affairs of the gods I was going to have to step up my game.

Giving my new body the raw durability of a demigod was a good place to start. It would be a lot easier for my armor to protect me from damage if I wasn’t so squishy to begin with. The enchantments I’d put on some of my elf body’s bones seemed to be working normally, so that was another hidden ace I could exploit. The next person who thought they’d caught me unarmed and unprepared was in for a world of hurt.

Alanna pulled me into her tree, and through it to a very different dream. In this one she stood in the middle of a wide field of lush grass, bordered by a stream and pond on one side and a stretch of open woodland on the other. The sky was a deep blue, without a trace of clouds, and the sun was pleasantly warm. Two trees filled with golden apples stood next to each other in the clearing, and their dryads lounged in the shade beneath them.

“Alanna!” Bodil called. “This refuge of yours is marvelous. But Runa says it’s just a dream. That can’t be right, can it?”

“There is nothing just about dreams, Bodil,” Alanna replied. “But Runa is correct. This is a dream of fertile serenity that I shaped for myself long ago, and hid in the most trackless depths of the dreamlands. The green dreams of field and forest surround us, and no animal can find a path through them.”

“Not even the damned squirrel?” Runa asked.

“Ratatosk was merely curious,” Alanna assured her. “Few travelers dare to brave the branches of the world tree in this era, and carrying taunts between the worm and the eagle is scant amusement. But he can’t leave the world tree, and even the furthest stretch of Yggdrasil’s branches barely touches on the realm of dreams. We will have no visitors from the waking world here, unless we summon them ourselves.”

Bodil shook her head in wonder. “I had no idea your mastery of the dreaming was so strong, Alanna. This place feels as solid as any land in Midgard. Not at all like my little attempts at dream shaping.”

“I expect that had more to do with Asgard’s wards than your own skill, Bodil. You’re welcome to practice here if you like, but be mindful of the neighbors. Not all of the forest dreams are friendly, and you may draw their attention if you stretch yourself. There’s a nightmare of strangling vines that likes to frighten visitors, and a dry summer day that seems pleasant until you discover it never ends.”

“We’ll be careful,” Runa assured her. “But how long will we be staying here? This can’t be the refuge you spoke of, can it? If we bear fruit in this place we’ll quickly fade into dreams ourselves, and then our apples will give only delusions of immortality.”

Alanna turned to me. “I’ll let you answer that one. I’m confident no one can eavesdrop on us here, but bear in mind that Runa and Bodil will eventually share any secrets they learn with Idun and their grove.”

“Eventually isn’t the problem,” I said. “Ladies, we’ve had to get pretty tricky to arrange your escape on the eve of Ragnarok, and I expect we’d have problems from both sides if anyone knew where to find you. So I’m afraid there are a lot of questions I can’t answer just yet. The plan is to hide out here for a couple of weeks to let the heat die down, and let the war on the Golden Fields get started. Once I’m confident that the gods are safely distracted we’ll sneak back to Midgard with you, and get you set up in your new home.”

“Where is that?” Runa asked.

“More importantly, who leads there?” Bodil said. “I want to know who our benefactor is, and what price we have to pay for our protection.”

“We’re taking you to Kozalin, where a wizard named Daniel the Black has set up a fortress meant to withstand the Fimbulwinter,” I said. “We already have three groves there, including the Bloody Thorns, and they’re weaving a miniature faerie realm anchored to their land. Alanna has been living there for a couple of months, so she can tell you what it’s like.”

“It’s an impressive feat of human power,” Alanna put in. “Even before Pelagia started her workings we had a cozy space large enough for everyone to spread their branches, with sun and rain that come and go on command, but all of it protected by a mountain of steel and stone. Then Daniel became lord of the Bloody Thorns, and gave them more power than the Olympians ever deigned to share. Now we can make space for your whole grove if we can get them out.”

They seemed intrigued at that, so I went on with my explanation. “As far as prices go, the only hard rule is that everyone in the fortress works together to defend it. Some of our dryads work as scouts, and others grow crops to keep our human troops fed. If an enemy ever gets inside the walls everyone needs to be ready to fight, but aside from that we’re happy to let everyone contribute according to their talents.”

“What about our apples?” Bodil asked. “Idun said we should each give up one apple as payment for being rescued, but people always want more.”

“I take it growing them costs you something?” I asked.

Both dryads nodded.

“It’s hard work,” Bodil said.

“Idun compares it to having a baby,” Runa added. “We need a good environment with strong magic, and even then they take years to mature. Each of us can make enough for several people, but overdoing it can cause us lasting harm.”

“The Aesir have strained us badly this last century or so,” Bodil complained. “The true gods don’t need us, but Odin has encouraged them to have hordes of children. Asgard has been overrun with young demigods all rushing to reach their potential, and a diet of our apples is the best way to speed their growth. We’ve been wasting away, trying to keep up with their demands.”

“Well, that’s over for you two,” I said. “We have other sources of both power and immortality, so we’re not going to be pushing you to overdo it. It’s more important for you to rest, and regain your strength.”

They both looked at me like I’d grown a second head.

“Our apples are the greatest treasure in the Nine Worlds. I can’t believe your master would have so little care for them!” Runa exclaimed, sounding almost offended.

“Do you think I risked my life to visit Idun because we don’t value you?” I responded. “No, we just aren’t in a rush. Odin pressed you for everything you could give because his back is against the wall, and he needs every edge he can get to win this war. We don’t have that pressure, and at any rate we’re well past the point where trying to rush the ascension of a bunch of demigods would help anything. So instead, we’re looking towards the long term. In Kozalin you’ll have the chance to rest, and rebuild your strength.”

“My wizard has a habit of taking in the bereft, and building them up to new heights,” Alanna told them. “He offers a bargain of protection, kindness and limitless magic, and all he asks in return is loyal service. For you I think he means to offer a temporary bargain, to last until Idun is free and your grove is able to find a new home.”

Bodil nodded along eagerly. “I see. His divine patrons hope to recruit Idun to their faction, don’t they? Well, I’ll be happy to take that bargain. After so many centuries of being locked away in Idun’s realm, I’d be happy to fight for a worthy cause.”

“I’d rather stay safe behind his walls, and content myself with meeting new people,” Runa disagreed. “But if he can truly offer us safety I’ll be happy to pledge my loyalty in return, and use my rune craft to support his efforts. And my apples, of course. Even if I’m resting, I could still give three or four per year.”

Bodil chuckled, and put an arm around her. “I don’t know where you get the energy, Runa. I can maybe manage two, if I’m going to get my strength back sometime this century.”

“That’s more than enough,” I said. “We appreciate your help, but there’s no need to push yourself.”

I visited with them for a few more minutes, just trying to get a feel for their personalities. But it felt a little awkward to talk with them when I wouldn’t even give my name. Before long I made my excuses, and retreated into Alanna’s bower to check the progress of my work.

The web of enchantments I’d set up was still humming along, growing my new body and infusing it with magic. Another day and it would be ready for me to start enchanting the skeleton. I was thinking a good set of structural reinforcements to make the bones unbreakable, and then some wards and utility spells. A power tap, a flight enchantment, a personal force field and a weapon or two. Yeah, the first assassin who tried to surprise me in the bath was in for a rude surprise.

By the time that was all done the enchantment factories I’d made in Asgard would have turned out enough components to replace my equipment. It had proved almost good enough to deal with the Lightbringers, and I already had ideas for improvements. The next time they came for me I was going to be an even tougher target, and I wouldn’t be fighting alone either.

It still wouldn’t be enough if I had to fight a god. I was hitting the limits of how much magic I could tie to my personal equipment, and gods were still a hundred times more powerful. But that wasn’t an insoluble problem. It just meant that I’d have to go… bigger.

I’d been wearing maybe forty pounds of enchanted gear in my fight with the Lightbringer assassins. A hundred times that only came to a couple of tons, which wasn’t especially big for a golem. There were all kinds of interesting possibilities there, if I could make time to work on them.

“Alanna, are Bodil and Runa going to be offended if I don’t spend much time with them?”

“Hardly. Unlike animals, trees have no need to spend every minute rushing about. They will be quite content to simply bask in the sunlight and rest for a time.”

“That’s good.”

“Besides, I will visit them from time to time. We have known each other since the days of Romulus and Remus, but the rift with my sister has made it awkward to visit. It will be good to catch up with them again.”

“Sounds like a plan. Well, I suppose I’d better take care of my obligations before I get too lost in work. I can’t risk sneaking back into Kozalin right now, but I can at least write the girls a letter. Only before that, I’d better check in with the boss. Will it work if I try to call Hecate from here?”

“You have such an odd way of speaking about the gods,” Alanna said with a shake of her head. “Don’t call on her within my bower, please. If she appeared here we would both be uncomfortably vulnerable, and she might well take it for a betrayal. Let us do this from my dream of desolation, instead.”

She led me back out to the desert, and I set up the ritual of invocation Cerise had taught me. Magic circle marked with her signs, wards against spirits and divination, an offering of power to open the connection and a polite request for attention. That last bit usually involved a lot of abject self-abasement and lofty praise for Hecate, when a coven of her witches dared beg for her attention. My own version was a lot more straightforward.

“Hecate, your errant Champion has a bunch of information for you if you have a moment to talk. If not I’ll put it all in a letter and leave it with Cerise, so she can get it to you-”

The moment I began to speak the ground inside the circle had darkened with pooling shadows. I didn’t get any further before they erupted, flowing upwards into the outline of a female form. Then they fell away, revealing the goddess of witchcraft.

As usual she was wearing an outfit of tight-fitting leather that covered her from the neck down. But there were gashes here and there where it had been damaged in some recent battle, and her cloak was nothing but a few tatters of cloth. Her pale face was lined with fatigue, but the same steely determination still burned in her eyes.

She crossed her arms beneath her breasts. “Finally, you call upon me. Really, Daniel, I was beginning to think you’d cast me aside for some other goddess.”

“What, like the goddess of making men do stupid things? No thanks, ma’am. I just didn’t think it was a good idea to call on you from the middle of Asgard. Odin didn’t show any sign of realizing I’m your Champion, but I didn’t want to push my luck.”

“So you decided to try your wits against all the powers of Asgard alone? How is that working out for you?”

Her face was cold, but there was a twitch at the corner of her ruby lips. A hint of a smirk that even a goddess couldn’t fully suppress.

“Well, let’s see. I blew up the Sunspire, made it look like the Lightbringers were responsible, helped Mara break the Fenris wolf out of his prison and escaped with two of Idun’s apple trees. Granted, I had to blow myself up to fake my death, so now I’m getting in touch with my feminine side. But I’ll be back to my old self as soon as I’m sure Odin is too busy to show up in Kozalin and demand answers in person. Then I can brag about how a little thing like death doesn’t keep a real wizard down for long.”

A smile full of vicious delight stole across her face, and she gave up the stern pose.

“I knew it!” She crowed. “My agents are telling me young One-Eye is furious with Ra, and threatening to drag his decrepit old ass into the war. Mara’s feat is the talk of the Nine Worlds, but everyone thinks she did it with only Aphrodite to help.”

Alanna draped herself over my back, and wrapped her arms around me. “You should have seen my wizard handle the golden bitch. She tried to seduce him, and he told her the game wasn’t worth the candle!”

“No! Really?”

“Really. I wouldn’t have believed it if I hadn’t seen it for myself. Although captivity has softened her a bit. It seems she’s finally learned that some acts have consequences even she can’t avoid.”

“Hmm.” Hecate came closer, gave Alanna a speculative look. “You’re looking well, old tree. No defiant speeches for me today?”

Alanna sighed. “How can I hold on to old grudges, when it would cost me such a magnificent wizard? We have had our disagreements over the ages, Hecate, but there is nothing I could not forgive. If this is an offer of peace?”

“It is,” Hecate said seriously. “I have always respected you, Alanna. Sometimes our interests have diverged, and at the time I did what I thought was necessary. But with the wisdom of age I have come to regret some of my rasher actions.”

“Then let us let bygones be bygones,” Alanna said. “I always support my wizard, and as long as you have his loyalty you will have my aid as well.”

“He’s a surprising fellow, isn’t he? I thought I was going to have to arrange a rescue from the heart of enemy territory, and instead he’s brought ruin to our enemies and escaped on his own merit. Although I really must hear how you came to inhabit the form of a Vanir maiden, Daniel. I hadn’t thought you were that sort.”

I could feel my ears heat. “It, ah, wasn’t exactly the original plan. But it’s only temporary, and I don’t think anyone suspects me.”

“Excellent. Then you must tell me the tale of this adventure, my champion.”

It took a while to bring the dark goddess up to speed, starting with the moment when I walked into the temple and found myself face to face with a pair of gods. Alanna played hostess while I talked, laying out a blanket and cushions for everyone to sit on and bringing refreshments. By the time I got to my conversation with Idun I’d gone through half a pitcher of sun tea, and Hecate was on her second bottle of wine. Not that it seemed to affect her.

“Well done,” Hecate said when I finally wound down. “You’ve struck a greater blow against Asgard than any champion before you, and the bastards don’t even know you did it. I wish I could offer you a suitable reward, but my influence in Midgard is sadly depleted.”

“I’m just happy to be alive,” I told her. “Do you think Odin will buy the misdirection?”

“At the moment he seems to think Mara recruited the Lightbringers to aid her mission, and blames Loki and Ra for the disaster. Returning from the dead will stir his suspicions a bit, but such feats are not unheard of for the wizards of Atlantis. As long as you remain missing for a few weeks first I think he will hold you blameless, especially after your warnings of sabotage in the Sunspire. Mind you, I’d recommend you never allow yourself to fall under his power again, for he will likely interrogate you if he has the opportunity.”

“I’ll keep that in mind,” I said. “Although I’m not sure what I’d do if one of the Aesir shows up at my door demanding answers. I’ve got some ideas for another round of equipment upgrades, and now that I’ve gotten a good look at them I’m confident that I can build weapons capable of killing a Great Beast. But that’s going to require huge, bulky mechanisms, so it would be awfully easy for a god to just avoid them. I’m sure there are plenty of ways to get into my fortress without getting shot at.”

“I think it unlikely that they will travel so casually with so many enemies at their gates,” Hecate said. “But If all else fails, I give you leave to call upon me. Your citadel holds the last of my followers, and my best hope for an age of renewal after Asgard falls. I will fight the Aesir to defend you if I must.

Alanna frowned. “But Hecate, if they know where to find you they will stop at nothing to see you ended,” she protested.

“That is why this is a last resort,” Hecate said with a faint smile. “But they would not find me easy prey. I have won new allies for myself of late, and time is on our side. Asgard’s position weakens with each passing day now, and we grow stronger. The pair of you will soon be a force to be reckoned with even in a battle of gods, and all those who you have empowered are growing in strength. My own martial skills have only grown sharper in my years of exile, and together I believe we could defeat even the Thunderer. Not that they would risk sending him in this dark hour.

“But we have other allies as well. Surely at least one of these ancient gods you freed will contact me, and be open to an alliance. The same is true of Bastet, who was a notable war goddess in her prime. She may be a child now, but that won’t last for long.”

“So I missed the birth? Damn, I was afraid of that.”

“You might have missed it even if you’d been home,” Hecate said. “To hear Cerise tell the tale, the whole affair scarcely lasted a minute. Just make sure you get home again before Bastet imprints on someone else as her father.”

“She’ll need a year and a day to grow up, at the very least,” Alanna said. “We have time. But this is an interesting group you’re putting together, Hecate. Hestia isn’t much of a fighter, but her blessings are quite powerful, and Idun is another enviable support resource. Do you intend to form a new pantheon, with yourself at the head?”

Hecate took a delicate sip of her wine, and stared into the cup. “A new pantheon? What an interesting thought. Such a thing could benefit all of Europe, especially if it were a strong one. Who knows who might flock to our banner, if we could offer protection from the chaos unfolding in Asgard? But I fear that I must acknowledge my limits here. I have a deft touch with magic, and a fair mastery of the warrior’s arts. But even at my best, I could never hope to match the power that Zeus wielded. A proper monarch of the gods must hold the power to command respect, as well as a sharp wit and a head for diplomacy. There are few candidates for such a post, and fewer still who are not already committed to an existing regime.”

Alanna gasped. “You can’t be serious!”

“Can’t I?” Hecate said blandly. “Daniel has already suggested it once. Granted, there are obstacles in the path that he had no knowledge of, but can we not see a solution to the greatest of them?”

“No god can even approach the mountain,” Alanna protested.

“Mara has not yet claimed her full divinity,” Hecate pointed out. “Yet if Gleipnir was unable to resist her power, I scarcely think an adamant chain will give her trouble.”

“The eagle would kill her,” Alanna said.

“Yes. But a modern wizard is the perfect answer to Zeus’ sentry, wouldn’t you say?”

Well, if they were talking about someone imprisoned by Zeus there was really only one possibility.

“You’re talking about Prometheus,” I said.

“Indeed I am. He is a fine warrior, charming and insightful, and a schemer of such depth that even today many suspect that his imprisonment is some sort of ploy.”

“He didn’t want to rule,” Alanna pointed out. “How will you convince him?”

“I have some ideas in that regard,” Hecate said. “But first, someone must convince Mara to leave her father’s side long enough to free him. What do you think, Daniel? Could you persuade her?”

“That would be tough. She’s obsessed with winning her father’s approval, and right now he needs all the help he can get. But she’d like the idea in principle, and it’s not like we don’t have anything to offer her. Gaea is pregnant again, and Mara is pretty desperate to save her sister from growing up the way she did. I’d say it might be possible if we approach her the right way, but it isn’t going to be easy.”

“The timing would be delicate,” Hecate conceded. “But Rome was not built in a day, and there are many other matters before us. All across Europe there are voices calling for my aid, and some of them might be of use to you. The powers of Summer have taken offense at Loki’s alliance with their ancient enemies, hint that they may be open to an alliance. There are Great Beasts who chafe under Gaea’s leadership, and survivors of the ancient world who yet lurk dark places hoping for the fall of the gods.

“So let us consider our plans, my Champion. You have proven your worth in such matters, and I am no longer so pressed for time. A thousand opportunities lie before us, and many of them are tied to your own doings. I shall lay them out before you, so that together we may choose which ones to take.”

“This is a rare opportunity,” Alanna said. “It isn’t often I have the chance to learn firsthand what the gods plan.”

“I hope you will not just listen, but speak as well,” Hecate said. “Limited though your strength may be, you are ancient beyond words and wiser than any of the young fools who rule the world today. I would welcome your advice, if you are willing to offer it.”

Alanna studied Hecate gravely for a long moment. Finally, she nodded.

“Very well, Hecate. You have been a benevolent patron to my wizard, and it seems that you are doing much as I would if only I had the power. There are some matters I dare not speak of, for fear of the consequences. But I will offer what counsel I may.”

“Excellent. Then let us scheme together, my comrades. While the great powers of the old order slaughter one another we shall creep like mice between their feet, and plant the seeds of a better world.”