Mist

a place like this, especially early on a weekday morning. They stared at her as if she had crashed an exclusive wedding wearing nothing but her sword.

As if she was an enemy.

“Leave,” Dainn whispered at her back. “Leave now.”

Mist barely heard him. “Who are you?” she asked, looking at each hostile face in turn.

Glances were exchanged, but no one answered. Dainn gripped her arm. “There are too many,” he said.

And suddenly she knew. “Where is he?” she demanded of the crowd in the Old Tongue, loosening her knife. “Where is your master?”

Hard eyes fixed on hers. Several of the men began moving toward her, getting taller by the second. Faces blurred, becoming coarse and ugly with hate. Fists lifted. An unmistakable chill rose in the room.

Hrimgrimir emerged from the crowd, grinning with hideous delight. “So we meet again, halfling. Or should I call you cousin?” His pointed teeth were red in the dim light, as if they were already stained with blood. “You must be eager for death. We will be happy to oblige you.”

For a moment Mist couldn’t process his words. Halfling? Cousin? It made no sense. None of it did. Why were the Jotunar in Asbrew? Where in Hel was Vid?

Pulling her knife free, Mist chanted the Rune- spell of change. Dim light raced along Kettlingr’s blade. She felt Dainn’s touch on her shoulder.

“If you must fight,” he said, as if from very far away, “know that youhave far more strength than you realize..Feel it, warrior. Let it come.”

She didn’t understand what in Baldr’s name he was talking about, but suddenly he was gone, and Hrimgrimir and his kin were upon her.

Kettlingr flew up to meet the attack. The blade skittered against a wall of ice that dissolved as soon as the sword completed its arc. She swung again, narrowly missing a giant’s arm.

Dainn had been right. There were too many, and she didn’t have the time or means to draw the physical symbols, the staves, that anchored her rudimentary magic and gave the Runes their power.

You can build them in your mind, she thought. She’d never even considered the possibility before this morning, but somehow she and Dainn had made it work.

Unfortunately, Dainn wasn’t here. She danced out of the way of a blow that would have flattened an elephant and tried to shape a repelling Bind-Rune out of her frantic thoughts.

The giantess who had swung at her gave a yelp of surprise and fell back. In the clear for a few precious seconds, Mist shaped a second Bind-Rune for strength and speed.

Suddenly a song rose in her chest—not merely a chant or a simple tune, but a robust, unfamiliar melody that throbbed with unexpected power. Strength greater than that of mortal or Valkyrie pulsed in her blood and blossomed in bone. Battle staves flared before her eyes. Driven by a compulsion she didn’t understand, she released the Runes from the pit of her belly like an opera bass reaching for his deepest note.

The giants retreated with cries of rage and dismay. She advanced, slashing at any flesh within reach. Dark blue blood sprayed walls and spattered the floor. For a moment it seemed that she might even win.

But the new power didn’t last. It drained out of her all at once, and she felt herself falter under the weight of uncertainty and sudden weakness. Hrimgrimir roared and struck with his enormous fist, knocking her against the wall.

Somehow she kept her grip on Kettlingr, but the strike had paralyzed her arm. She knew then that she was going to die, and she, unlike the giants and elves and gods who had survived Ragnarok, would not be returning. What became of the Aesir and their Treasures would be beyond her concern.

Sliding up the wall on rubbery legs, she grinned into the Jotunn’s face and prepared herself for the final, crushing blow. Hrimgrimir bellowed and raised his hand again. Then the door to the bar swung open, and a thickset blond man staggered into the room, his head swinging right and left in confusion.

“Wa’s goin’ on here?” he drawled, leaning heavily against the doorframe. “Can’ a man get any sleep?”

Hrimgrimir and the other giants turned to face the man. “Get out!” Hrimgrimir snarled.

“Mist?” The man took another step into the room, eyes widening. “Issat you?”

She caught her breath and worked her shoulder, feeling it come back to life again. Vali was a hard drinker and usually under the thumb of his elder half-brother, but he wasn’t as stupid as he sounded. He hadn’t just been wakened out of some drunken stupor. One look at his face told her that he knew what was happening. And he was trying to help her.

With a hoot of laughter, Vali stumbled past the Jotunar blocking the doorway. “So . . . gla’ to see you,” he said, his full weight crashing into Mist. “Missed you.”

Smothered in his bearish embrace, Mist felt the pressure of his body pushing her away from the wall. He was moving her toward the door, inch by subtle inch.

“Get out of here,” he hissed, his mouth pressed to her ear.

“Where is Vidarr?” she whispered.

“You can’t see him.” They reached the door, and Mist heard the hinges creak. “Save yourself.”

“Where is he?” she demanded. “Is he in trouble?”

“I said, you can’t—”

Without warning Mist shoved Vali aside, swinging Kettlingr before her, and ran for the back door. Hrimgrimir swiped at her and missed. The rest were too startled to intercept her before she got to the back door and flung it open.

Vidarr sat in a battered chair the room that served as his office, his face blank as uncarved stone. His eyes barely flickered as Mist burst through the door. She slammed it behind her and scanned the room. Gungnir lay in plain sight on the wide, battered desk behind Vidarr’s chair.

“Your manners disappoint me, my dear Mist,” a voice said from the shadows behind the desk. “And so does your judgment. I had hoped you would take warning and flee. After all the pleasure you’ve given me, I had intended to spare you.”

Eric. But it wasn’t Eric’s voice. And the figure that emerged from the shadows was not tall and broad-shouldered, but as lean and wiry as a stoat. He was dressed in black from neck to toe, modified biker’s leathers adorned with flashy metal trimmings and emblazoned with a stylized flame. His eyes were brilliant green, the irises rimmed with orange. His red hair was artfully styled, and his long, handsome face was smiling.

He looked nothing at all like the man she’d come to love. But her heart lurched under her ribs as she realized who she was seeing. Loki, the great Trickster, once beloved of Odin. The child of powerful giants, Loki was one of the few divine beings— not quite a god— who could change his shape completely without relying on illusion or possessing the body of an animal or man. At times he had saved the Aesir, at other times opposed them. His constant scheming had been overlooked until he had killed Baldr, the blind god, with malice and treachery.

The punishment they had set for him had planted the seeds of the Last Battle.

But he had many flaws besides a propensity for duplicity, not least of which was overweening pride and belief in his own ultimate superiority.

And that meant he could be beaten. Not now, not by her, but by those who were coming.

Swallowing her instinctive fear, she faced him squarely. “I’ve come for Gungnir, Slanderer,” she said.

“How charming.” Loki walked past Vidarr without a glance in his direction and stood before her, hands on hips. “You always were impulsive, darling. That was what made you so entertaining in bed, even if your other skills were not”— he looked her up and down— ”quite as well developed as I might have preferred.”

Mist swung Kettlingr at his head. Loki sent the sword spinning to the floor with three short words and a wave of his hand, violently twisting Mist’s fingers.

“It’s no use,” Vidarr said, his voice thick with despair. “You can’t beat him.”

“Listen to the Silent One, villkatt,” Loki said. “Like you, Odin’s son has been corrupted by his long residence in Midgard. He let his magic fade over the years. He proved remarkably ineffective in his attempts to resist.” Loki reached for the glass of red wine that stood on the nearby desk and sniffed it critically. “I confess I am a little surprised that you found me so quickly.”

Mist made a show of nursing her twisted fingers. They hurt like the devil, so it wasn’t really a show at all.